Friday, November 11, 2011

Feeding dunlin, Parker River National Wildlife Refuge

Photograph of a dunlin about to eat a clam at Parker River NWR

The seventh beach at Parker River National Wildlife Refuge on Plum Island came through for me again on Tuesday when I went out looking for shorebirds in the late afternoon. The weather was absolutely beautiful, which meant that there were many more people on the beach 2 hours before sunset than I had seen on my sunrise trips, but the birds didn't seem too perturbed by the small crowd. As the sun crept closer to the horizon, the beach started to empty out and it was mostly birders and other photographers wandering across the exposed sediments of low tide. It was a nice change of pace on this trip to have a flock of mostly dunlin and black-bellied plovers to photograph, instead of the sanderlings like on my previous trip.

View more photographs of dunlin and other sandpipers in my Sandpipers Gallery.


7 comments:

  1. a beautiful photograph; the light seems to be reflecting onto the underside of the Dunlin almost from that little puddle. Is it feeding on a shellfish maybe?

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  2. Lovely photo Pat. Had a close encounter with a pair of these last year and they have been my favourite wader ever since.

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  3. Exceptional photography, as always!

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  4. Beautiful photo Pat. I went to the refuge website. It looks like a great place.

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  5. Amazing shot with spectacular colors !
    regards,
    Olivier

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