Day 4: Squawking Seagull

2026-02-10

Hello!

This photo was taken on the same trip as yesterday's photo of the day, and I wanted to share this one because there's a story I didn't tell last time. Consider this a sequel post.

Most of the time, I stayed at the park lake. That's where everyone else was, and so that's where the action is. It's where I took the shot of an ice skater gliding into the sunlight. But it's also where I saw boys throwing breadcrumbs at ducks and seagulls. And rocks. ("Did you see? I hit its beak!")

Look, the first result when searching "ethical wildlife photography" is an article by National Geographic. And its first rule states "Do no harm". So I want to be clear; I was not throwing food or stones at the birds. I was actually decently far away, with a heavy zoom (technical info for nerds is down below). I got closer, and the boys saw me with a camera in my hand. Must have looked official or something, because one of them pulled the other aside and said "hold on", and they moved on after that. Self-awareness. It's great. I probably should have said something, though...

For reference, Wikipedia and Google Lens say that this is a ring-billed gull. I welcome corrections from any of you newsletter readers who know birds. Regardless of what bird it is, I really like their striking expression as they were making a call (I think I can see its tongue? Not sure).

Is there a lesson or moral to this story? Not really — I just want to journal this memory as an example of being kind to the world and standing up, even in the small ways :-).

Finally, a link to a good photography article. The Smithsonian Magazine put out an article in July 2024. I never realized that "nearly a third of the United States’ population [took] up photography" — that seems like a lot of sales for such an expensive hobby and art form at the time. Even more interesting: the article claims a whole economy on photography prints was formed. Today, even when most the US population has a smartphone, they're not selling their prints and making a business. I found this article through another email newsletter.

Thank you for visiting this blog! Special thanks to the newsletter subscribers; you get this photo a week before the internet does :-).

Cheers,
David