JUNE 2022
This month’s newsletter is about bird photography in the steppe regions of Hungary. These images were taken during our recent photo tour there.
Here’s a Blue Tit photographed from one of the reflecting pool blinds. The steppe regions of Central Hungary are quite arid locations which means that small drinking pools often attract large numbers of birds to both drink and bathe. During each of our sessions in three different drinking hides we always photographed between ten and twenty species. The settings for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 400mm 1/2000 at F6.3, iso 2000. With these reflection shots I will vertically center them when I crop them. The pools are setup to produce beautiful clear reflections. Like most of the blinds in Europe, there is high quality photographic glass covering the front of the blind which you shoot through.
The tower hides, which are constructed in small stands of trees where lots of nest boxes are put up, are one of the highlights of any Hungary bird photo trip. These nest boxes attract large numbers of Red-footed Falcons, a colonial nesting species, as well as European Rollers, Eurasian Kestrels and Jackdaws. This makes for a lot of exciting subjects at eye level. When I first started shooting through the glass I wasn’t sure how well my camera would track birds in flight, but it didn’t seem to affect the performance much and I was able to make some images I really liked including this female Red-footed Falcon with its tail splayed. The settings for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 300mm 1/2000 F6.3, iso 2000, manual exposure, handheld. I zoomed out to have a better chance to get the falcon in focus despite the fact that I knew I would be cropping a fair bit. With 45 megapixels on the R5 I can get away with it.
You get some interaction both within species and between species when photographing from these tower blinds. In this case as a male Red-footed Falcon flies over a pair of European Rollers, the male Roller seems to shield the female as she looks up at the falcon. On this particular nest box the background was busier than I would like but I loved capturing this action. The techs for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 400mm 1/2500 F7.1, iso 2000, manual exposure, handheld.
This close up of a European Roller taking off was one of my favorite images from our five days in Hungary. The bird was perching eye level on a perch which was attached to the tower blind. Every so often it would take off and fly down to its nest box which was attached to the underside of the tower. This gave us the opportunity to take a top side shot of it as it took off. The bird was too close and I cut the wings so I cropped it the same on both sides and I really liked the result. The techs for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 227mm, 1/2500 F8, iso 2000, manual exposure, handheld. Although this is a good sized crop you can see how close I was to the bird photographing at only 227mm!
There are plenty of opportunities for static portraits of birds from the towers as well, the colors of the Rollers are stunning. The techs for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 349mm 1/2500 F8, iso 2000, manual exposure, handheld. I certainly could have dropped my iso some here but I almost always like to keep my speed up in case of action and the image quality of the R5 at iso 2000 is quite good.
Photographing the colonies of European Bee-eaters is certainly one of the highlights of bird photography during the summer in Eastern Europe. These birds nest in colonies in the ground and in sandbanks. There is usually a lot of activity at the colonies making for fun interaction shots. I managed to catch these two in a mid-air tussle. I found the eye tracking system in the R5 to be very good at tracking these erratically flying birds. The techs for this shot were Canon R5, 100-400 at 400mm 1/3200 F8, iso 1000, manual exposure, handheld.
There are also plenty of good waterbird photo opportunities in Hungary. Jure photographed this Whiskered Tern from one of several floating hides. The techs on this shot were Sony a7R4, 200-600mm lens, 1/4000 F6.3, iso 1000, manual exposure, handheld.
Here’s another shot from Jure. Hoopoes are a very common but spectacular species in Eastern Europe. Nest boxes are often placed near reflecting drinking pools to add another excellent subject when they are breeding. This perch is placed on the way to the nest box and used as a stopping point before going into the box. To capture this image Jure prefocused on the perch with his camera on the tripod locked down. When he saw the Hoopoe flying in he fired off a round of shots. The techs for this shot were Sony A7R4, 200-600mm at about 400mm 1/2000 F6.3, iso 5000, manual exposure, tripod. Another example of how well these mirrorless cameras handle high isos, even though this isn’t the top performing Sony model. In conclusion, Hungary has spectacular bird photography from blinds in the late spring and early summer.