This female Hooded Merganser dived and came up with this small fish. I have no idea what kind it is, seems yellowish to me. Anyway, it seems big enough for a good lunch for the merganser. I feel fortunate to capture this shot as I had my Coolpix 900 today instead of my super-fast D500, and the P900 is not an action camera. I got a lucky break! Or rather, time and chance were in my favor today.


Eloine, whose comment is found below, makes a point that brings up something really interesting! Her comment gives me an answer raised by two other shots I got of this incident. I have a shot where the bird has the fish in its beak, but then one where it is looking down at a wave ring in the water. I can only guess that the merganser came up with the fish, then lost it. The shot posted would be the second one where it has lost hold of the fish, and the one of it looking at the ring in the water would be the third shot. I can’t think of any other explanation, because the bird's beak is closed and the fish is on the other side of it, as Eloine noted. Wow!

ADDENDUM: Matthew made an interesting point in his comment below. The reason I say this is because when I checked the three shots I have of this, the last one shows the merganser swimming away with the fish in its beak! So it somehow got it without losing it. If the bird had the fish by the fin it would mean it managed to hang onto it! That's the conclusion I have to come to because of that last photo.