photoartflightYellow-Crowned Night-Herons
I was going through old hard drives and found this series of images from 10 years ago of a pair of Yellow-Crowned Night Herons that were nesting on a busy side street leading into a park and baseball fields in Northern NJ. It seemed like a strange place for their nest since there were woods and a pond just a couple of hundred feet down the road, but they chose a busy street section. I followed them photographically (from a far distance with a 400mm Canon DO f/4 lens and the Sigma 300-800mm f/5.6 lens @800mm and 1.4X & 2x Telconverters) for their nest building and raising the young. The images featured here were when they were first building their nest and displaying near the nest. The featured image was shot with a 400mm f/4 Canon DO lens & 2X teleconverter with fill flash before sunrise with a Better Beamer flash extender.
Early morning, 400mm f/4 DO with 2X Teleconverter @ 800mm, Fill Flash with Better Beamer
400mm f/4 DO with 1.4X Teleconverter – 560mm
400mm f/4 DO with 1.4X Teleconverter – 560mm
Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron Displaying – 560mm
Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron Early AM @ 800mm
Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron @ 800mm
Yellow-Crowned Night Heron Displaying @ 560mm
800mm @ 8 PM
Early Evening – @ 560mm
Early Evening @ 400mm f/4 DO w/2x Teleconverter – f/10 1/250 – Displaying
Early Evening – 400mm f/4 DO w/2x Teleconverter – f/10 1/250
Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron Displaying
I had made a pdf e-book on the nest building and the Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron family. This is back cover
photoartflight 
Great series, Reed. I love the male displays and the gangling fledglings! Looks like a very full nest, too.
Thanks Eliza! They were fun to watch and photograph! They came back the next year, but the Utility company came through when they were rebuilding the nest and destroyed it and trimmed down all the branches so they moved on.
What a sad ending to an otherwise happy story. 😦 Humans are the worse invasive species.
You’ve caught the herons in some great poses. Excellent series, Reed!
Thanks Belinda! They were fun to follow through their nest building and then seeing the chicks interacting with each other.
WOW, Reed, these are stunning! I’ve never seen such displaying, congratulations on this series!
Thanks Donna! It was a fun series to photograph
These are incredible shots of an amazing looking bird, Reed. It was really cool that you were able to observe the night-herons for an extended period of time. I chuckled when I saw that you took some of the shots with the monster Sigma 300-800mm lens. I seem to recall that you no longer have that lens or no longer use it, owing in part to its size and weight.
Thanks Mike! They were fun to photograph and follow thru the nest building and raising the chicks. Yes, I sold the BigMonster years ago. Sort of sad because it was a Great lens to work an area. Extremely sharp images and for flying birds you could zoom out to find them and then zoom in for the shots. But with a tripod, Wimberly Gimbel Head and camera it was over 25 lbs to lug around. But if you used it to work an area it was Great and very versatile! I now use the Tamron 150-600mm. I found that a Sigma 2X teleconverter works well with it, pretty fast focus and sharp on the Canon R. Gives me a 300mm to 1200mm range. Thanks again! Enjoying your shots from Paris!
Nicely done Reed – I am still trying to get this species in the tin.
Thanks! It was a fun series to photograph! Seems they are harder to find so it fun when you do get a chance to photograph them. Besides this series I probably only have seen & photographed them a few other times in my travels.