After over a decade of birding and wildlife photography, you might think it would start to be coming boring – or at least common. And there are days that it does, days where I’m out shortly after sunrise and it’s already hot, humid, and all I see are robins, sparrows, grackles, or geese. These are indeed common birds for the region, and I have plenty of photos of them already in my archives.
But each encounter with wildlife of any kind is an opportunity. Each individual is unique, both in looks and tolerance. Sparrow number 952 might pose perfectly for me, or have ideal lighting, or alight with a caterpillar in its beak. So I watch the regular through my lens and even snap a few photos, just in case it ends up being the encounter.
What keeps me going out, keeps me revisiting and waiting and looking, is the chance for something unexpected. And when it happens, the payoff is worth the effort!
This is one of those cases; I was walking down a tree-lined road through the park, and amid the antics of the expected birds I heard something new. I am not adept at birding by ear, but even so this call stood out. The best way I can describe it is the sound of someone hitting a slightly rotten branch against a tree trunk, that wood-against-wood sound but with a slightly hollow tone.
Moving slowly and scanning the treetops, I was able to hone in on the call and discovered the bird pictured above, which I did not recognize. That’s the moment where anticipation turned into full-blown excitement – here, in a place I have visited easily over 100 times, was an entirely new (to me) species!
Meet the black-billed cuckoo, one of two cuckoos native to the region, the other being the yellow-billed. This individual remained in this treetop for several minutes, preening and making his hollow-wood call. I was shooting perpendicular to the light, into rather dense shade within the canopy, which was less than ideal. But for a first encounter I am very pleased with the photos, and the opportunity to work with a new creature.
The next time I hear a cuckoo call, I’ll know what it is – and hopefully the conditions will be right for an even better encounter.