A young male Mallard Duck, exercising in a tidal pond at Valdez, Alaska. It shows how fast and powerful the forward stroke is by the fact that the wing tips are blurred and the water spray is streaked at a shutter speed of 1/2500! You can see the effect of the compressed air in the shape of the splashes and spray in front of him.
Sony a6500, FE 100-400 GM w/1.4 TC @ 560 mm, ISO-400, f/8.0, 1/2500, hand held.
Thanks, I’ve been waiting for one of these. Lately there have been posts like this where the bird is 10% of the image. This one brings me to the behavior. Nice place to be and see.
TY for post
Gary, a fine catch, especially with the water in front of the bird mimicking the wing shape and showing that it’s the wing motion that’s driving the water. The details in the bird are outstanding. Pretty amazing that the bird is doing all of that with out the action of landing. A fine bit of natural history.
Very nice, Gary. I agree with Mark, the way the spray of water is shaped like the wings is really nice. A fine image for the WC, for sure. 
A beautiful image, Gary. The water and wings are great, but I’m particularly drawn to the flow of the feathers on the back and the base of the wing.
