Geoff Coe's photostream  

A recent photo of two (of three) raccoons in Dahoon Holly at Six Mile Cypress Slough, Fort Myers.
1/250, f/5.6, ISO 640, 100-400mm Canon zoom, Canon 7D. Flash fill with Better Beamer to get some exposure on those eye sockets!

I was staying in Boynton Beach during the Jupiter ArtiGras festival, so drove a few miles south to Wakodahatchee Wetlands for some early-morning shooting before Day 2 of the show. Got my first ever photos of a Purple Gallinule. Beautiful bird. I took some "record shots" but really liked this more "rulebreaking" shot with its play of colors: the kind of picture my friend Angie (Justabird2) takes so beautifully.
Tech stuff: Manual exposure, 1/2000, f/6.3, 500mm f/4, ISO 800 hand-held (tightly braced against the boardwalk railing. I hate using tripods on boardwalks!)

Another image from my late-day visit to Venice Rookery last Thursday, Jan. 19. I used a tripod and a slow shutter speed, and panned with this Snowy Egret as it flew over water to the rookery island. Because the birds were flying in dappled late-day light, I used automatic exposure (shutter-priority mode) at 1/13 sec so that the exposures would be decent regardless of whether the flying subject was in sun or shade.

I'm always a little puzzled when I see photographers with pro-level tripods and long telephoto lenses packing them up a half hour before sunset. There were five or six shooters when I arrived at the Rookery at 4 PM, and all but one of them left by 5:30, when shadows began creeping up onto the rookery island. The sun didn't go down until six.

After picking up some work at my lab in Venice, I swung by Venice Rookery to check out the action. Some Great Blue Herons on nests, one with chicks. Lots of Great Egrets around too...this was the only one I saw displaying. I was able to scramble down the bank along the SW edge of the pond to a get a good vantage point.

Very nearly a full frame image, with minimal post-processing: just a bit of sharpening on the eye and beak and a small levels adjustment. Exposure (below) reckoned by giving +1 stop off the blue sky well above the egret. (For a dark bird like the Anhinga in the same light, I'd have given +1 2/3 stops, but I didn't want to risk blowing out the highlights on the white feathers.)
Tech stuff: Canon 7D, 500mm plus 2X teleconverter, 1/250 @ f/11, ISO 400. GItzo tripod and Mongoose M3.5 gimbal head. The relatively slow shutter speed was possible only because this bird held the pose so beautifully while I shot in the gorgeous but rapidly fading light.

A Great Blue Heron perches on a tall snag in late afternoon at Babcock Webb last week.