Virginia Rail

This was a truly amazing encounter facilitated by a bit of early morning playback. The usually-sneaky bird popped out of the marsh fifteen feet in front of me, and I decided to go for a headshot because I couldn't frame the entire bird with my 600mm lens. I was set up at 1/3200 and f/5.6 because I was hoping for action frames, but a quick switch to 1/1600 at f/8 afforded me additional depth-of-field at such close range. Pretty stoked with the resulting feather detail!

Sierra Valley, Sierra County, California, 5/30/21
Canon 600mm f/4 IS II on EOS 1DX Mark II
1/1600 at f/8, ISO 800