Nature Watch: Azure Kingfisher

This Azure Kingfisher was snapped by birdwatcher and Gazette columnist Jeffrey Addison at Paynters Creek on Friday April 22. This diminutive species inhabits the vegetation beside waterways and other wetlands, where it often perches on low, overhanging branches, searching for its prey of fish, crustaceans and aquatic insects, captured by shallow plunging into the water. Anglers on lonely rivers are sometimes surprised to find an Azure Kingfisher perched quietly on their fishing rods instead of a branch.