We see lots of female Common Mergansers around here and have had lots of opportunities to get shots of them over the years, but the males are hard to come by and tend to be very shy when we do encounter them. Not this guy. He was completely unafraid of me and posed for 15+ minutes in front of my camera at times so close I had to zoom out and back up to keep him in the frame. The only problem is the lighting was so bad today the photos I tried to take were all pretty much unusable. The lighting would have been fine for songbirds in the bush but not for waterfowl with irridescent coloring that is only visible in sunlight and on water that takes on a murky appearance in heavy overcast. It was exciting to see this guy so close like that but also frustrating that the light was just not there for the amazing shots that could have been.