I'm not completely sure I knew there was a white morph of the Reddish Egret until two weeks ago, and I certainly don't think I'd seen one before that...

So when I saw this bird while Annie & I were driving along the beach on Padre Island I did a double-take. The bill is clearly that of a Reddish Egret, but of course it is white. The birder in me thought to reach for my Sibley's. Fortunately the photographer in me took over first and grabbed my D700 and 600f/4 which were sitting ready on the console next to me. I was able to hand hold the combination thanks to the bright light (which unfortunately also made it hard to render the feather detail) and squeeze off a few shots before the bird flew on.

Then, at leisure, I could look the bird up and find out what it was. Cool! Once again one of my favorite unwritten rules of wildlife photography is to shoot first and ask questions (or look at the book) later. Whenever I see a bird or mammal I don't recognize I'm quick to work to capture it with my camera. Not only will there be time to identify it later but I'll have the photos to help. Of course for birds which need to be identified by call this gets a little tricky and you need to get lucky enough that they stick around long enough that you can get some images and also identify their vocalizations. And most of the time the mystery critter is just an animal with which you're familiar in a different light. Most frequently its a species that I've seen before but in different plumage or perhaps a female instead of a male or vice versa. In all these cases it's great to have the photograph.

You might think that all this is a no-brainer, but you'd be surprised. Often photographers spend so much time worrying about what an animal is that they lose the chance to photograph it. Especially with digital the cost of some frames you may not want later is almost nothing while the opportunity cost of missing a series of photos you may never be able to capture again is painful.