brown pelican

Vivid brown pelican with purple pelican bokeh St. Petersburg

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Brown pelican with friends at The Pier - Nikon D300 Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/1250thIf you do not have any pelican photographs in your portfolio, you can head to The Pier in downtown St. Petersburg at almost anytime of day and have the opportunity to make one of a number of types of brown pelican images.  The male brown pelican was resting on the deck along with a few friends waiting for a tourist to mount the feeding platform and toss out a few free snacks.

Photographing pelicans at The Pier is also a chance to get very close to a very large bird.  They are used to having people around so you can find yourself being able to get close enough to them for it to start to kind of feel weird.  The pelicans will look you in the eye kind of saying, "what?!"

Brown Pelican Bird in Flight St. Petersburg Florida Fine Art Nature Photography

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Brown Pelican preparing to dive St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/1250th

Regular followers of my nature posts will know that I am very fond of photographing the many local brown pelicans in my St. Petersburg, Florida neighborhood.  I have not yet achieved my long-term goal of photographing a pelican skimming just over the water, but I was glad to be able to add these images to my pelican portfolio.  On Saturday pelicans were regularly diving out of the sky into the water for fish around The Pier.  Once getting the settings dialed in using shutter priority mode and multi-point focus, it was just a matter of tracking the birds fast enough as they made their dives.

Brown Pelican on an aerial fish survey - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/6.3 ISO 200 1/1250thThis collection of pelican images focuses on the birds as they are about to make a plunge into Tampa Bay hoping to come up with a beak-full of small silvery fish.  Observing a bird's behavior is key to being able to capture the photographs one wants.  I watched where and how they circled and what they did with their wings right before their split second descents.

Brown Pelican wings arced for diving in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/6.3 ISO 200 1/1000thDuring this shoot I also became, at long last, a believer in shutter priority mode.  With the pelicans diving from a bright blue sky background down to the dark waters of Tampa Bay, I knew what shutter speed I needed to freeze their flight, but adjusting the aperture constantly to maintain the correct exposure would have been nearly impossible.  Thus, shutter priority was the best exposure mode to use for these bird-in-flight images.

Brown Pelican hovering before diving in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/4.5 ISO 200 1/1250thI also used multi-point focus because I was able for the most part to fill the frame with the pelicans, allowing the 21-focus points to act as a net.  If I could not fill the frame with the pelicans, well, I probably would not even push the shutter, but in that case I would use a single focus point to place right on the bird to distinguish it from any other possible background elements.  In relative close-up shots like these, the multi-focus point setting gave me the best chance of landing a focus point on the subject (pelican) where a single focus point might get lost under a single wing flap.

Visit The Pier for great pelican and bird-in-flight photography opportunities:


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    • Two heads are better than one - Florida Pelican Fine Art Photography

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    quizzical brown pelican - Florida Fine Art Photography - Nikon D300 Nikkor AF-S 105mm VR micro f/2.8G lens @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/160thThe many brown pelicans that make St. Petersburg home are a frequent photography subject of mine.  These birds are often very approachable, allowing one to look deep into the bird's eye, a rare human-non-human-animal close-up encounter.  I am always curious what animals are thinking.  Since they supposedly have a much different perception of time, how does this affect how they think?  If pelicans cannot think of the far future and who knows how far back their memories of past events go, what occupies their minds?  Perhaps nothing enabling them to live in a blissful present?  I often get the impression pelicans look upon humans with contempt, "go on with your life and quite gawking at me," I imagine them saying.  Are humans the only animals that feel wonder toward other animals?  Does a pelican look upon a great blue heron and think it is beautiful or merely a competitor for food?

    unimpressed brown pelican - St. Petersburg Fine Art Photography - Nikon D300 Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens @ f/4 ISO 200 1/1250th


    Florida Brown Pelican Fly Hunt Sleep at The Pier St. Petersburg

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    FLY -- Brown Pelican in flight St. Petersburg Florida -- EXIF: f/5.6 ISO 200 1/1250thRegular readers will know that I enjoy and often photograph brown pelicans.  They are not a rare bird around this part of Florida at all.  In fact, it would be rare to go to any coastal area of St. Petersburg and not see one.  However, I find myself continually drawn to photographing them despite my usual instinct being to not photograph things that are commonly photographed.  Plus, I have a bit of unfinished business as I still want to photograph a pelican in flight hovering just over the surface of the water as they are apt to do.  Catching one in flight like above requires seeing the bird approach from distance, tracking it as it swoops in, then of course have sufficient shutter speed to freeze it in mid-air.  Maybe some luck is required too?

    HUNT - brown pelican looking for lunch at The Pier St. Petersburg Florida -- EXIF: f/5.6 ISO 200 1/1600thI used my Nikkor AF-S 105mm VR micro f/2.8G lens for all these shots.  It is not a very long lens but The Pier provides a very close vantage point for photographing pelicans as they fly, hunt and sleep.  To photograph these three different female brown pelicans I observed and studied their behavior.  Of course the sleeping one was not a challenge, but the flying one took a sharp eye to find and photograph and I needed to follow the hunting pelican from pier top to pier top until I could catch her while still standing at the ready.

    SLEEP -- brown pelican catching a little shut eye at The Pier in St. Petersburg Florida -- EXIF: f/5.6 ISO 200 1/800thAs these photographs illustrate, brown pelicans do not all exhibit the same behavior at the same time of day.  Some flew, some hunted and many slept.  One day, I will photograph one of you skimming over the water's surface!  Until then, expect more pelican photographs of another nature.

    These brown pelican photographs are available for commercial license and fine art print, inquire today!

    Pelican vs. Great Blue Heron Sunset on Snell Isle Battle

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    brown pelican vs great blue heron - f/5.6 ISO 200 1/1000th

    Two of the largest birds in Florida are the brown pelican and the great blue heron.  They are a common site around Snell Isle.  I have seen both and photographed both many times in the past, but I never caught them in semi-battle with each other.  This particular great blue heron often likes to stand on the edge of a small dock nearby.  I see him/her on my evening walks with Kiki.  This brown pelican too likes to frequent the water around here dive bombing in for a late dinner.

    Well, this time the pelican was diving too close to the great blue heron and she/he got cranky and the showdown pictured above took place.  The pelican was determined to eat, the great blue heron was determined to hold her/his ground.  In the end, the pelican moved on and the great blue heron returned to his/her usual stoic stance.   

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    • Photography Tip - long lens for landscapes

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    Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8D @ f/8 ISO 200 1/500th - Pelicans in front of new Dali Museum St. PetersburgYou do not need to use a wide angle lens to make a landscape or panorama shot.  For the above photograph of two pelicans out on The Pier with the St. Petersburg waterfront in the distant background I used my favorite Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens at 80mm.  To create the panorama look I simply cropped the image.  Shooting at f/8 and 80mm allowed the distant background to not be totally blurred out (bokeh) while at the same time still create a unique sense of depth to the image that one cannot produce using a wide angle lens.  

    In the comments below link to your long lens landscape/panorama shots.  

    A pelican hiding inside of a pelican

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    brown pelican (female) - Nikon D300 with Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens @ f/4 ISO 800 1/400thPelicans are very malleable birds.  Though they may not be very beautiful or majestic, I think if I had to live life as a bird I might choose to be a pelican just for how many different ways they can fly, swim and rest in.  One of my long term photography goals is to photograph a pelican at near eye level as it just skims over the surface of the water.  In the meantime, I still find pelicans in new positions I have not seen before.  

    The above female brown pelican had her neck turned 180 degrees with her beak resting between her wings in a homemade feather pillow.  Using my Nikkor AF ED 80-200mm f/2.8D lens @ 200mm I did not disturb her at all to make this photograph, but I cannot tell for sure if she was sleeping with one eye open or not.  

    I wondered what she was dreaming about.