Back in September I went to Farmington Bay WMA in Northern Utah. I observed an adult Western Grebe with two chicks till the sun went down. Here are a few of my favorite images taken over the course of a few hours.
During my time with the Grebes, I noticed one of the juveniles was more aggressive than the other. As soon as the parent came up with a fish in its bill, the two would race to swallow it down. But the aggressive chick was faster and fed more. I know this happens all the time with wildlife, but it’s interesting to see it happen.
After several rounds of feeding the chicks, the adult finally decided to feed themselves. The chicks were making lots of noise, chasing after their parent every time they had a fish in their bill.
On a side note, I haven’t spent much time with the Canon R6 that I upgraded to earlier in the year. So this visit was to test out the new gear. The image below is a 100% crop of the above image and you can see just how sharp the details are.
I was pretty impressed with the quality the R6 produces and it’s my first mirrorless camera. I do miss my trusty Canon 7D MKII and the Tamron 150-600mm..that was a great combo and I’m now using the R6 with the Canon RF 800mm F11, which is a bit restrictive due to the aperture. This lens doesn’t do well in low light and works best when there is a lot of contrast or colors. It’s nice to have the reach though and paired with the R6, you can get sharp details and get away with a higher ISO.
My favorite image out of all is the Adult and a chick right at sunset. I tried to get shots of both chicks in the picture, but the sun was going down fast and the smaller chick lagged behind. Over-all, that evening was well spent with nature.