Working a Subject: The White-breasted Kingfisher

There is no doubt that going to exotic places and driving many miles in pursuit of that killer shot can result in some highly desired images. Yet, what I find most rewarding in nature photography is ‘working a subject’ and this is not generally possible when you are ‘on safari’. This strategy follows from advice I was once given: the best equipment you have in your arsenal is your binoculars, and that observing and understanding your subject is one of the most important aspects of what we do.

I want to illustrate an example of this to get my point across. While living and working in Singapore I had heard rumors about a Bee-eater nesting ground in Penang, one of Malaysia’s northern states, where I live. Even though a local photographer gave me GPS coordinates to the site, finding it was still rather cryptic; a sporadically used motocross track with carefully designed humps intended to launch gravelly-throated motorcycles and their leather-clad jockeys skywards. This lumpy paddock surrounded by trees became my outdoor studio for the last two years. Two species of Bee-eaters and one species of Kingfisher nest there (utilizing the jumps and banks to drill their nest holes). Other species nest in the nearby trees and Red-wattled Lapwings nest in divots in the field that are often just inches from the designated race track.

For this example, I will ignore the Bee-eaters and Lapwings and instead focus on the White-Breasted Kingfisher. These are common kingfishers in Southeast Asia but common does not mean easy to photograph. This species has a beautiful azure blue wing surface and tail, a chocolate brown head and body with a white bib, a white patch on the wings (thought to be a visual center point in signaling each other) and a red/orange bill. My desired shot was a Kingfisher approaching the nest carrying some sort of interesting prey. It was way too fanciful to hope that hungry chicks would lean out of the nest cavity with open bills. There were at least 4 pairs of this species of kingfisher in the immediate area. One pair liked to sit in a tall tree at the center of the circuit and dive on unsuspecting prey. Last year they attended a nest hole on a jumping hump some 50 yards from the central tree. Both the male and female would often perch near my SUV, from which I did all my shooting. In this respect they were different from their genetic peers who were much more circumspect. They would catch frogs and insects and bash them before flinging them skywards to get the hapless victim in a better position for ingesting. Last years nesting was aborted suddenly and both sexes looked rather ragged as they were ravaged by the labor involved in nesting and a seasonal molt.

I decided to leave them for several months until the onset of the 2013 season. My first visit in 2013 revealed that the observed pair was still based in their favorite tree but both were resplendent in a new livery. The female had richer blue feathers than normal. I would arrive on site just before sunrise and several mornings in the early months I saw them mating. They were also from time to time exploring the established nest hole. I observed them hunting, feeding and preparing the nest. I was hopeful that this year they would be successful in raising a brood. The flight path from their favorite tree to the nest hole was strategically at right angles to the morning sun that in the first two months of the year was beaming from clear skies. Bright sunlight is important for the high camera speeds needed for flight shots. I had subjects accustomed to my presence, a nest hole in a desirable location in respect to light direction and also a distant green background.

I was surprised a few weeks later to see that the pair were excavating a new nest hole that was fortunately on the same bank but displaced by around 20 feet—the other prime shooting parameters remained in place. Surprise later changed to excitement when several weeks later I noted them taking turns at visiting the nest with ‘cargo’. There was a skeletal tree about 15 yards from the nest entrance in a line from the perching tree and around 60% of the time they perched on this before flying straight into the nest. With this species incubation is 28 days and fledging takes around the same duration. I had 28 days to get my shots of the hard-working parents feeding their 4–6 likely offspring (I suspect there were 5).

I did not visit every day as the motocross riders used the track in the weekend and it was also physically tiring spending 4-5 hours in an un-cooled vehicle in the tropical sun. The return in terms of images however was exactly what I had hoped for. I would get 15-50 nest visits during the time I waited. This pair accustomed to my presence would allow me to get close enough to use my 500mm lens mounted on a beanbag. When the sun directly behind me was fully clear from clouds I could get speeds up to 1/8000 second with an aperture of f/8. The cargo carried to the chicks ranged from insects to lizards and skinks to frogs. The 4–8 eggs would have been laid over several days so there would be an advantage to the chicks that developed and hatched first. The day before the chicks fledged the female flew 45 sorties to the nest in 3 hours. I did not see the chicks fledge but as soon as the first two were out of the nest the parents stopped bringing in food despite the protests of the 2–3 chicks left inside. An inspection two days later revealed that all chicks had left.

The newly fledged chicks were quite autonomous and I was content with a good return for 18 months of observation and positioning. My experience and observations also worked well recording the nesting cycles of both species of Bee-eaters and the Lapwings.

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