Great Frigatebird (Fregata minor)
Photographed off Daphne Island, Galápagos Islands, Ecuador
Day 3 of the Galápagos trip
I'm a lover of raptors of all kinds and very much enjoy seeing and photographing them, especially in flight. While a Great Frigatebird is not a raptor, it's*also* amazingly graceful in the air and seems to never need flap its wings at all. This and other frigate birds followed our ship as we headed away from Baltra, giving me a great opportunity to shoot photos of them as they glided over our heads while we were on the top deck of the ship.
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From Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_frigatebird
"Frigatebirds have long narrow pointed wings and a long narrow deeply forked tail. They have the highest ratio of wing area to body mass and the lowest wing loading of any bird. This has been hypothesized to enable the birds to use marine thermals created by small differences between tropical air and water temperatures."
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