Great Lakes region, USA. June 2026.
I've seen a ton of great egrets this year. I love watching Ardea hunt. One of the coolest genus of bird IMO.
this post was submitted on 21 Jun 2026
184 points (99.5% liked)
birding
5796 readers
154 users here now
Welcome to /c/birding, a community for people who like birds, birdwatching and birding in general! Feel free to post your birding photos or just photos of birds you found in general, but please follow the rules as outlined below.
-
This should go without saying, but please be nice to one another. No petty insults, no bigotry, no harassment, hate speech,nothing of that sort! Depending on the severity, you'll either only get your comment removed and a warning or your comment will be removed and you will be banned from /c/birding.
-
This is a community for posting content of birds, nothing else. Please keep the posts related to birding or birds in general.
-
When posting photos or videos that you did not take, please always credit the original photographer! Link to the original post on social media as well, if there is one.
-
Absolutely no AI-generated content is allowed! I know it has become quite difficult to tell whether or not something is AI-generated or not, but please make sure that whatever you post is not AI-generated. If it is, your post will be removed. If you continously post AI-generated content, you'll be banned from /c/birding (but it's obviously okay if you post AI-generated stuff once or twice without knowing you did so).
-
Please provide rough information location, if possible. This is a more loosely-enforced rule, especially because it is sometimes not possible to provide a location. But if you post a photo you took yourself, please provide a rough location and date of the sighting.
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It's a lot of fun, though sometimes gross, but one can't really get any closer to animals, unless maybe you become the next Jane Goodall or something.
I've eyed up some used gear before. My friend uses Canon, but I tend to find my eyes drawn to some Sony (A series?) and the Olympus OM photos, but I never know how much is the camera vs the person behind the camera and Lightroom.
I believe I've used Snapseed in the past, may have to check that out again, and Darktable comes up on here a lot so maybe I will give that a spin too.
I'll have to poke around and see if there is a local rescue I can volunteer at.
If you do wander into looking for gear, definitely weigh the pros and cons of each sensor type. Bigger sensors and smaller sensors offer tradeoffs.
I'd suggest trying to take more purposeful photos with you phone camera first then look into gear. Its training your mind to recognize opportunity that matters over gear. Bird photos can be hard in the wild though. Having a decent zoom lens is really helpful.
I appreciate the tips! Maybe I'll have to work on getting some pics of my backyard animal friends some more and gone my skills.