{"id":270,"date":"2020-06-24T11:45:05","date_gmt":"2020-06-24T11:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/?p=270"},"modified":"2026-02-17T11:03:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T18:03:16","slug":"2020-6-24-back-to-the-wetlands-020120","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/?p=270","title":{"rendered":"Back to the wetlands – 02\/01\/20"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Couple weeks later and I\u2019m back to the wetlands. This time much earlier in the morning. Dressed more appropriately so I could stay out for longer.<\/p>\n

Right off the bat when I arrive there are some waterfowl to be seen.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 2500<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Canadian Geese, beautiful creatures. I got some shots of a pair of them slowly floating along the water for a time before they starting their pre-flight honking. My cue to get the camera ready.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 1600<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The pair of them took off one after the other, I was focused on this one. The water splashes in front are from the other goose that had just taken off. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 2000<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Their feathers are so cool, and not something you ever get to see this detailed since they keep them tucked onto their body obviously. <\/p>\n

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It wasn\u2019t too long before another subject came into view. And the of the rapid fire shots I took, this one I really like.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 1600<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Talk about some feathers. Although sad to see them missing a few. <\/p>\n

The Great Blue Heron wasn\u2019t alone, but was harassing another animal that I would have never guessed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 1600<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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An OTTER???<\/p>\n

Dude. Yes. What. Wow.<\/p>\n

Those were the thoughts going through my head roughly. There was a pair of otters playing around in the water just going back and forth. The Heron was following them, flying from spot to spot anytime they got close to land. Not entirely sure why, the Heron certainly wouldn\u2019t try to eat them I don\u2019t think. And I don\u2019t think they had a fish they were trying to chow down on. <\/p>\n

This went on for some time, I tried really hard to get a shot with both of them in view but it just wasn\u2019t happening. Although this shack is great for viewing a big wide area. It\u2019s pretty far from the action. Shooting at least one or two hundred feet away. Even with the big lens I needed the extender on there to get some halfway decent photos.<\/p>\n

Like some great ones of the Heron coming in for a landing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 1250<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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And another from the back view when it flew away from me.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 1250<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Canon 7D Mark II w\/300mm + 1.4x – 1\/800 Sec – F4 – ISO 500<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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That last one was the only shot I could get of both species in frame. Not great of the otter, but you can tell that\u2019s what is in the water on the left hand side. <\/p>\n

I knew river otters existed obviously, never thought I would actually get to see some out in the wild. I\u2019ve been back to this location many many times but have yet to see them again. I think they are further up river that came to this big pond. There isn\u2019t exactly a trail so exploring it safely and without disturbing any nature has been more difficult. <\/p>\n

Also I research otters a bit more and found that I\u2019ll probably only see them on really cloudy days like this.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Couple weeks later and I\u2019m back to the wetlands. This time much earlier in the morning. Dressed more appropriately so I could stay out for longer. Right off the bat when I arrive there are some waterfowl to be seen. Canadian Geese, beautiful creatures. I got some shots of a pair of them slowly floating […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-old-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=270"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1801,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270\/revisions\/1801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelbward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}