Black Skimmers, a very worthy opponent 😁.
All it takes is a brief sighting and everything else stops. Photographing a Skimmer fishing is not easy, maybe one of the most difficult shots to get.

When working the surface their flight can seem erratic. They do see the small minnows just below the water and chase them. But they also have a pattern to covering the wider marsh areas.
This bird was hunting a very large salt marsh, even at high speeds the full circle could take over five minutes. All you can do is wait for the next pass (if he doesn’t get distracted and change flight).


This Skimmer circled and fished the same general path for at least a half hour. Each time we could grab a few bursts, then wait.
This single bird was here hunting the same area, about the same time, two days in a row. Being a Skimmer we missed as many shots as we got. But that’s the fun of it.
Shhhhh, never let them know you snapped a soft one ha. Great shots, those birds can definitely be tricky although a bit more predictable than those erratic terns.