Around Christmas last year, I was excited to find a few hooded merganser ducks on St. Simons Island, Georgia. They are beautiful birds–well, the adult males are.
He has a bushy, black-and-white crested head and beautiful yellow eyes! The females and immature males both have brown coloring. To tell them apart, you look at the eyes and beaks. The females have dark eyes and yellow beaks. The immature males have yellow eyes and thin, black beaks.
When I saw the mergansers in December, I was not able to get any real good close-up shots. I was excited though to have the opportunity to photograph such an amazing bird.
In January, I went back to St. Simons and knew finding the mergansers was a high priority. Before church on Sunday morning, I went out early. I knew where they were hanging out, so I walked up and down the sidewalk along the marshy area near where I saw them last.
Then one adult male merganser came into sight. Boy, was I excited! He swam around the bend in the creek, so I ran with all of my equipment until I got to a small bridge where I might be able to see him again. When I saw him, he was swimming along with a great egret looking at him.
Then I returned to my previous position and found 19 merganser ducks! I was in awe. Not only did I see them, they were swimming straight toward my camera. I knew those birds were there just for me. The Lord is good.
I hurried back to get dressed to go to church. I had a smile on my face as I sat in church, because I really felt like I had already been in church!
I call these encounters my divine appointments. When I pray and ask the Lord to show me or bring to me what He wants me to photograph, I am excited at what I may find.
My divine appointments are not few and far between, and they tend to stick with me because they are amazing–I am amazed all the time!
