I recently wrote a post on the topic of You Don’t Always Get What You Want (but you usually get something). This time I would like to share an experience of not really getting what I expected and ending up with far more than I could have hoped for.

A long planned but uncertain short spell of leave saw a last minute winter trip booked up North to Waipu Cove, where we have previously been in the late spring. It is my favourite spot for photographing the critically endangered New Zealand Fairy Tern/ Tara iti. They tend to overwinter on the west coast harbours and head to the east to breed so I wasn’t expecting to see them at this location at this time of year.

I was however expecting to see a good number of New Zealand Dotterel/Tūturiwhatu so my hope was to have some time to expand my catalogue of images of them. Somewhat surprisingly we saw none during a long beach walk where we would usually have encountered many. I finally found one lone individual and managed a couple of images as it foraged amongst the flotsam picking out crane flies.

Progressing further along the beach seemed rather pointless so we took a gap in the dunes to head to the estuary side as the path back was firmer underfoot. The estuary is a lovely habitat with a Pied Shag colony and increasing numbers of Royal Spoonbills along with regular Caspian Terns/Tara nui flying up and down in search of food. We were walking along enjoying the dune back vegetation and usual avian suspects when I saw the typical hovering and dive of a Fairy Tern/Tara iti as it fished the near shore before departing down the estuary with it’s partner. Excited would be an understatement!

Previous experience suggested that it would retrace its path at some stage so I found a spot on the shore and settled down to wait in the bracing southerly. Feeding Kingfisher/Kōtare, Spoonbills/Kōtuku ngutupapa, Pied Shag/Kāruhiruhi and Pied Stilts/Poaka kept me distracted but I had to make a point of regularly checking for a returning Fairy Tern. They are so small that you can’t see them from any distance, they are just suddenly there hovering.

I’m not quite sure how long it took, maybe an hour, but I lose all track of time when absorbed with bird behaviour. Suddenly, as if by magic, it was back, hovering into the wind and searching the estuary margin. The wind angle wasn’t ideal as it was facing away from me but by waiting until it turned to move briefly up the estuary I could get an engaging pose. Overexcited would be an understatement!

I only had one pass to work with before he headed up the estuary and then turned to fly rapidly back down toward the mouth. Never the less I managed a number of images I am very happy with. It has been my first opportunity with Fairy Terns using the Nikon Z9 and Nikkor Z 800mm f6.3 VR S. Previously I have been using the D500 and D850 with the AF-S 500mm f4 with 1.4x teleconverter which was heavier setup. Focus acquisition was much of a muchness but once locked the Z9 did a better job of holding focus and tracking which, along with the higher frame rate, gave me more options to choose from.

In the end hoping for NZ Dotterels resulted in a bit of disappointment but an unexpected Fairy Tern sighting maximised with a little patience and anticipation of behaviour from previous observations was rewarded with an exciting highlight of the trip. So much so that I have already booked my next visit!