New Hollands Preening

New Holland Honeyeaters are comical to watch but can look seriously sweet when preening.

 

New Holland Honeyeater (Phylidonyris novaehollandiae)
1/2000, f/7.1, ISO 1600

 

The bird above was preening when a rival came a bit too close; New Holland Honeyeaters are lively, rambunctious critters.

New Hollands can be found across southern Australia from just north of Perth to around Brisbane, including Tasmania. They are about 18cm in length and weigh about 20g and can be tricky to photograph as they move so fast and camera settings have to be set carefully to ensure that the blacks and whites are properly exposed. They are mainly black and white with a yellow wing patch and yellow tail sides. Their underparts are streaked black and white, they have white eyebrows, white cheeks patches and white malar patches that extend from the base of the bill.

 

New Holland Honeyeater (Phylidonyris novaehollandiae)
1/2000, f/7.1, ISO 1600

 

 

I’m often asked about shutter speeds for bird photography. Shutter speeds are measured in fractions of a second, for general, handheld photography a speed of 1/60th of a second is considered good as it lessens the possibility of blurring but such a slow speed would only be useful for taxidermied birds or roadkill. I remember a budding bird photographer being astounded that 1/160 wasn’t fast enough to capture birds. I have used 1/1600th and 1/2000th to freeze the action in these images.

 

 

New Holland Honeyeater (Phylidonyris novaehollandiae)
1/1600, f/11, ISO 1600

 

I especially like the image above where the New Holland Honeyeater is carefully detailing its plumage. Sometimes it’s more than the pose that appeals to me. In this shot I like the background bokeh, the simple perch and foreground, and the way the bird’s bill parallel to its body – I feel a bit nerdy after admitting that.

Happy birding

Kim

 

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