Friday, February 23, 2018

This joy, it swallows itself far too soon!

The photographs were taken yesterday morning in the north parts of Nuuksio, within a swamp that is circled by hills from all sides. It is the time of courtship display for capercaillies. Never before has it happened that one of the birds comes to present himself to me, and was not afraid at all.

The bird followed me a couple of hundred meters across the swamp, and I took a lot of photographs, but had to leave because my fingers and toes were getting cold as the temperature was at -22 °C.

I even took three short video clips, even though I usually never use the LX100 for taking videos. When I listen to the sound in the video, it almost feels as if the bird would be trying to say "isä", which means "father" in Finnish. (Thanks to Atso Almila‏ for pointing this out on Twitter.)

(Posting title is from the poem Bay Window Lauds by Marcus Wicker.)

2 comments:

Mike said...

Nice photos and videos. I wonder what was going through this bird's mind.

Juha Haataja said...

It is the time of the year when capercaillies get a bit crazy, trying to find a mate and keep other birds away from their swamp. But it is relatively rare that a bird gets this friendly with a human being.