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Dacnis cayana
Bird shown is a male. About 12.5cm long (5"). Stunning blue with black/indigo wings and tail showing blue streaking. Black throat patch and face mask. Bill is black and slightly down curved, legs are pinkish. Female is of similar size but mainly green with olive wings and tail and bluish head.
Found in a variety of forested habitats as well as the edge of clearings and on occasion in well planted gardens. Can be seen at all levels of the forest but not usually on the ground. This bird seen on the Argentine/Brazil border near Iguassu on the Argentinian side.
These great little birds are quite quiet in the bush and only occasionally call. They feed on insects and small fruits and usually forage in pairs or small groups in the company of mixed flocks. Ref: Wildlife Conservation Society, Brazil.
Spotted on Nov 7, 2015
Submitted on Dec 6, 2015
8 Comments
Thank you Desmond, I appreciate your comment. These guys almost glow when the sun hits them.
Soooo Awesome!!!
Thank you for your input Malcolm. Great tips and being relatively new to the world of photography I appreciate any help with stuff like this. Light is often an issue in the bush so using a higher F stop # has to be paid for with shutter speed or ISO - all good stuff and great to be learning. Thanks again. Robert
Depth of field is surprisingly critical when photographing birds. As an example, if a bird is 20' (6 metres) away and you use APS-C (1.6 crop), 400mm zoom and F5.6 then DOF will be only about 1¼" (3cms)!
1 stop to F8 will give 50% more DOF
25% less zoom (eg 300) will double DOF
Double the distance to the subject will give 4x DOF
One tip I heard is to always try to focus on the birds eye. The DOF will be 1/3 in front of the eye and 2/3 behind it.
Dragonflies are much worse because they tend to be closer.
Thanks Malcolm. Interesting link - see I need to work on my depth of field a bit when the image is that big :)
breathtaking capture :)
gorgeous!
Great picture, I looked at the full size version here: http://lh3.googleusercontent.com/j4BSpkM...