Galileo

April 7, 2012, Saturday, Istanbul

We are in Riva. The place is packed with bird photographers, but the lighting conditions aren’t great, and there aren’t many birds around. Still, being out in the field is always enjoyable. In the afternoon, the sun finally comes out. Serhat Tigrel and Ömer Necipoğlu are in one car, and I’m in another, waiting by the stream for a Water Rail I spotted to come out of the reeds where it's hiding.

Serhat has set his sights on the Glossy Ibises standing further down in the stream. At one point, he gets out of the car and says, "I’m going to try to approach those ibises from behind the bushes, come on." Since I wasn’t feeling too hopeful and didn’t want to go through the hassle of changing my shoes to cross the muddy area, I declined his offer. But Serhat was determined and went ahead.

A good while after he disappeared into the bushes, I checked, and the ibises were still there. He had succeeded.

When he returned half an hour later, he was even more insistent and managed to convince Necipoğlu to go with him again. The presence of nearby Water Buffalo made the ibises more tolerant of movement and noise, while the bushes provided excellent camouflage, allowing us to get as close as 10 meters. For the last five meters, we crawled into position.

We were relatively close, but the ibises were feeding behind a dry-branched tree in the middle of the stream and wouldn’t move into the open. At that moment, Yavuz Eryavuz joined us. A while later, Serhat left our position, attempting to flush the ibises into the open for us. For a moment, it seemed like he would succeed—they began to move away from the branches. But before they fully emerged, they took flight and escaped. We returned to our cars with only partial shots of the ibises among the branches.

After wandering around the Riva meadows for a while, I went back to check on the ibises, hoping for better shots. Yavuz joined me. This time, we were luckier—the ibises were out in the open, and we managed to take decent shots. After a while, other birders in the field attempted to approach, scaring the ibises away.

Thanks to Serhat’s determination, what started as a mediocre day turned into one where we managed to capture some decent shots of the glossy ibises. In bird photography, determination, timing, and patience are crucial.

It’s not always about having the best equipment or the perfect conditions—sometimes, it’s about persistence, knowing when to wait and when to take action. That day in Riva, we were reminded once again that patience often pays off in unexpected ways.

Indecision and delay are two major causes of failure.

Galileo