Mike Powell

I was delighted to see some Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus) last week at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge. In the first photo, a male  Red-winged Blackbird seemed to be showing off for me as he balanced himself on a single leg, glanced in my direction, and seemed to smile. Eventually he climbed to the tip of the small branch and appeared to be complaining about something that he observed.

A short distance away I captured the final image of a female Red-winged Blackbird. As you can she, she is not black nor does she have any red on her wings, so it feels a little strange to call her a Red-winged Blackbird. Although I was not able to get very close to her, I really like the overall composition of the image and the moment of action that I was able to capture as she called out.