I have written before on the importance of going out to photograph without expectations but at times we need to be focussed on an objective. This was the case recently when Edin and I spent some time in the South Island. The objective was to get photos of Rock Wren and Rifleman for a book she is doing. With this in mind we based ourselves on the Milford Road at Knobs Flat so that it was easy to access beech forest and Rock Wren habitat near the Homer Tunnel and Gertrude valley. We hadn’t given Black-fronted terns a second thought until we saw them flying over the flats of the Eglinton river while driving from Te Anau to Knobs Flat. We stopped and got a few record shots with the intention of spending a bit more time with them in the coming days.

The next morning we geared up and were heading toward Homer Tunnel with Rock Wren in mind when we passed a mob of Black-fronted Terns hawking in the warm morning light at the top of Knobs Flat. This prompted a U-turn and we spent some time photographing them against distant beech while they flew over the grass dipping down episodically to catch a grub. Continuing on the Homer Tunnel we had a spectacular lack of success on Rock Wren but managed some reasonable Kea images.

As mentioned in a previous post we encountered some unseasonable weather and woke to 4 inches of snow blanketing the ground and still falling heavily. We could see the terns still flying in the snow so walked down toward the river to watch them. It was hard to imagine that they could see anything with the snow blanketing the ground but they would episodically dip down and flying up with a prey item in their bills. It was a great opportunity to photograph them in a different situation and the white snow acted as a lovely reflector creating a lovely soft enveloping light that really showed off their grey breeding plumage with white moustachial stripe and orange bill and feet beautifully.

Terns are generally associated with the sea but some do venture inland. In New Zealand it is not uncommon to find Caspian Terns at inland lakes. Black-fronted Terns are unique in that they migrate inland to breed on the braided rivers of the South Island in the spring. I have not had the opportunity to photograph them in breeding plumage before so it was great to see them at their best and to photograph them in the snow was an unexpected bonus. While we achieved our objectives of Rock Wren and Rifleman photos the most unique images we got were the Black-fronted Terns flying in the snow. 

All photos with Nikon D500 and Nikon 300mm f4PF lens.