Tag: India

What is a “quirky moment”?

The answer is largely a matter of the relevant human observer’s/participant’s experience, sensibility, attitude.

One person’s “surprising” or “bizarre” or “amusing” is another’s “to be expected, in this particular context”, “prosaic”, or “unremarkable”

What is happening in the featured image is a case in point.

A heron (or egret) in hunting mode delivers a fascinating, repeating sequence of events.

For unpredictably short or long periods the heron is a study in concentration and stillness, until that stillness is suddenly shattered by the bird’s speargun-like attack.

The prey – usually a small fish, crustacean, mollusc, amphibian or insect – is swallowed, rapidly.

The sequence then repeats…

For obvious reasons, a photographer cannot “capture” this behaviour from a very close vantage point, directly in front of the heron’s beak/“speargun”.

However, one can sometimes get surprisingly close, “from behind”.