Watching Wren was awarded first place in Maple Grove Magazine’s Focus on Maple Grove photo contest. It is also the first photograph amateur photographer, Brigid Gress, captured with her Nikon P510. Gress loves taking wildlife pictures and purchased the camera for its extended zoom. “I was sitting on my deck fiddling with the camera when I spotted the wren perched on a bird feeder,” Gress says.
Gress loves the clarity of the bird against the photograph’s blurred background. She also likes how the wren is glancing toward the wren house in her apple tree. Gress hangs two clean wren houses each spring to attract wrens. “The male builds a nest in each birdhouse for his mate,” says Gress. “She chooses one and lays her eggs. Then he sings to her everyday from dawn until dusk. I would have liked to snap the picture of him singing. But the moment was very spontaneous.”
Gress points to the irony of a wren that eats bugs photographed atop a bird feeder. An added bit of irony is that bird was Gress’s childhood nickname. “I’m not sure why,” she says. “It had something to do with my name Brigid being similar to the word, bird. It stuck with me all through high school.”
Photo contests winners are awarded a gift card to National Camera Exchange. Gress has already purchased a tripod for shooting more wildlife photos and hopes to take a class specific to her camera.
