Loten's Sunbird

The upper photograph is a female Loten's Sunbird while the lower one is the male. I had posted the sunbirds a few posts earlier, but this is the closest that I have come so far.As you can see in the first photograph the bird usually feeds on nectar, but may also occasionally feast on insects.
The male bird in the second photograph is actually sitting on the rear view mirror of a vehicle and was a few moments earlier trying to peck its own reflection on the mirror.

Sunbirds

Lotens Sunbird.
A female Purple Rumped Sunbird. I have posted photographs of sunbirds and some notes earlier on this blog. Posted these new photographs, since this time around the framing was better.
The bird sometimes hovers like a humming bird while sucking nectar, giving a false impression to many, that it may be a humming bird.
Clicked at Nacinola in Goa

Lotens Sunbird

Early morning today, I was photographing a Lotens Sunbird, feeding on the nectar of coconut flowers. I kept following the bird, through my camera viewfinder, Continuously photographing it. After a while I noticed a sudden change in it's plumage, as apparent in the third photograph. Two bright yellow tufts appeared on either side of its breast out of nowhere. I kept on clicking and soon managed to shoot the fourth photograph. The Upper bird is the Male Sunbird, the one that I was following and the lower one in an acrobatic position is a Female Sunbird. The Reason for the change in the male's plumage was the presence of a female around and he was obviously trying to attract her. Male Sunbirds frequently bring out these beautiful tufts from the underside of their wings, during breeding season and I consider myself lucky to photograph this sequence.
Sunbirds are very small birds, this one was may be 10 cm in length, they also are swift fliers and rarely perch at one place for long. These factors in addition to the height of the coconut tree made photographing this bird a little difficult. I was shooting on Aperture priority with widest aperture and placed the camera on a short tripod and laying low as inconspicuous as possible.
Since the Underside of a coconut tree is dark, to achieve a faster shutter speed, I clicked the photographs at ISO 200, hence slight noise is visible, when you zoom in the Photograph.