Australian Pelican a series

These images occurred by chance. I arrived at Soldiers Point and found that Trevor Murray and Rob McNeil working on three Beach Stone-curlews. Trevor was slowly stalking the feeding birds which also meant that the birds were slowly moving closer to Rob and myself. It was an interesting setup with the birds alternatively catching an occasional soldier crab and then simply resting on a single leg and it was simply a matter of observation and recording the Beach Stone -curlews and they alternatively foraged and rested. I noticed the Pelican glide low over the water from afar and directly to the spot where we were...perhaps in retrospect it was thinking we may have been fishermen and fish offal was the attraction. The bird landed and then strutted to the waters edge and the three Beach Stone-curlews took flight to the near-by island. End on that session !! However Pelicans in full clean plumage are an impressive sight. Here the new arrival struts forward.
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Title: So what's going on here ??
Australian Pelican (Pelecanus conspicillatus) Soldiers Point NSW
Canon EOS 7D Lens 400mm L USM 5.6 ISO400 F7.1.0 1/4000 available light 30 May 2012 9.47am
The strutter quickly found that there was little to do on arrival and settled down down for a few minutes feather shuffling and preening. That allowed a camera adjustment and a couple of portrait studies.
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Australian Pelican (Pelecanus conspicillatus) Soldiers Point NSW
Canon EOS 7D Lens 400mm L USM 5.6 ISO400 F11.0 1/1250 fill flash 30 May 2012 9.50am
Pelicans ooze presence but in close the nuances of feather colour and detail really come to the fore overall. The texture and colour of the head and beak are a major feature. The following image is simply a closer crop the above image in an endeavour to emphasise the head area.
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Hope you enjoy this series.
Thanks for viewing
Best regards
Rod Warnock

Thanks for sharing. lovely indeed

Great series .

Nice set... keep coming