Action at the Hummingbird Feeder

After our temperatures mercifully dropped when we got our first significant rainfall in months yesterday, I got out in the backyard late this morning to see what I could do with my Canon EOS R8 adapted to my 1962 Questar.

As I was getting my focus and composition nailed down, a yellowjacket flew in to have a sip at the hummingbird feeder.

Not long after that, a hummingbird came in for the same.

Considering that both yellowjackets and hummingbirds have a tendency to be rather competitive, it was inevitable that the two would have a bit of an encounter.

The yellowjacket won.

(As an aside—and I will spare you the gory details—I had no idea what mere insects were capable of against hummingbirds until yesterday. Right before rain showers moved in, I heard a hummingbird squawking and buzzing its wings in futility. I had a closer look, and at first glance it appeared that it was caught maybe in some kind of spider web. A closer look revealed that a praying mantis had gotten hold of the hummingbird and was in the beginning stages of consuming it. It was one of the more gruesome sights I’ve seen in a while. I had no idea praying mantises could take out a hummingbird. Not really sure what to do, I decided to let nature take its course. With fair warning about rather graphic images that may disturb you if you have a soft spot for hummingbirds, have a look at this Audubon article for details.)

Moments later after the yellowjacket had moved on, a hummingbird—I’m not sure if it was the same one as earlier or another of the many that were buzzing around our backyard this morning—came in for a good drink at the feeder.

My Canon R8 did a great job with handling high ISO noise. My hope was to get an improvement in image quality while also maintaining a higher shutter speed of around 1/1000 sec. in order to freeze the mind-boggling fast motion of hummingbirds in flight. With my Questar’s aperture fixed at f/16, the only place the camera has to turn for exposure latitude is ISO. The results I got this morning were much better than what I have been able to accomplish with my little Canon EOS M200 mirrorless camera and its cropped sensor. Due to the R8’s larger sensor, there is more vignetting, but it’s not overly objectionable. I’ll take a little vignetting in exchange for a reduction in high ISO noise.