As a child, Rajiv Roy was out duck hunting with his father in West Bengal, India, when his dad swung his 12-gauge shotgun toward a flock — and Rajiv — and fired. “I ducked, and he was smart enough that he didn’t shoot me, but I did see the shot go by,” Roy recalls. “I remember at that point saying to myself that when I grow up, I won’t go hunting with a gun, but I will go hunting with my camera.”
Roy forgot that promise during his successful career in the U.S. semiconductor industry, but his interest was sparked anew after he spent time photographing the extraordinarily diverse wildlife in the Galápagos Islands in 2014. “I had a camera with a 60x optical zoom, like a point-and-shoot with a bigger lens,” he says. “When you zoomed in, you were totally amazed at what the camera picked up — the beauty and glorious colors that you see in close-ups.”
Back home in his Old Lake Highlands neighborhood bordering White Rock Lake, Roy sought out local bird photographers to learn from them. He kept using his Nikon Coolpix, but after about 18 months, he accepted that he needed better tools and invested in a Sony Alpha camera with 200- and 600-millimeter telephoto lenses.
Now, he regularly shares eye-catching images of birds on Nextdoor and other social media channels, identifying the location and species. Sometimes he includes videos of them singing or preening. The whole idea is to snap a great photo without disturbing the bird. “The greater Dallas area is truly remarkable for birding and bird photography,” Roy says, pointing out that Dallas is on the spring and fall migration paths taken by such colorful birds as Baltimore orioles and painted buntings.
“I thought our neighborhood on Nextdoor needed to know what an incredible gift we have,” he continues. “People who have lived here for years will say, ‘I didn’t know we had scissor-tailed flycatchers in our neighborhood.’ It’s a bright spot in their day, and I’m glad if it brings a little joy.”
It takes a great deal of patience and time to capture images like his bald eagle silhouetted against the moon or a great horned owl preparing to fly, its wings fully stretched. “It wouldn’t be something you take a 3-year-old to [do],” Roy says with a chuckle. “You have to be very still, because birds detect motion … . If you stand still, they ignore you. If you move, they’re off.”
Roy, 64, got the bald eagle shot by first envisioning it. He was jogging around White Rock Lake when he noticed a full moon, so he ran home, grabbed his camera and stood near the eagle’s nest for about an hour, waiting for the moon to move into the ideal place.
Then, he lay prone on the shoulder of Buckner Boulevard for about 20 minutes — he acknowledges that was “probably dumb and dangerous” — waiting for an eagle to land on a tree with the moon behind it. “The bald eagle is my favorite shot, but a purist [bird photographer] wouldn’t love that it’s mainly black and white,” he says. “To me, it tells a story. It looks very majestic.” Like his eagle portrait, Roy shares, the best shots are typically made by people who are listening and looking for specific species.
Roy hasn’t linked up with a formal birding group in Dallas, but he feels connected to bird photographers throughout the world via social media and birding applications. “There is a global community of like-minded people who want nothing more than to take great pictures and in the process bring awareness to nature and conservation efforts, and be appreciative of the gift nature has given us and be good stewards of it,” he says.
Roy enjoys the whole process, noting that being out in the fresh air improves his mood and outlook and certainly beats sitting at home. “I go out there in the greenery, intent on listening for birds, and it’s an absolutely wonderful feeling,” he says. “When you start spotting the birds, it’s just miraculous. You take pictures and look at close-ups, and you are in awe of nature.”
As for the childhood hunting episode, Roy says it came back to him when he was telling friends his theory that bird photography is just like hunting, except the trophies are shared on social media instead of on a wall, and there’s no violence.
“All of a sudden, I realized deep down I had told myself that I was going to do bird photography,” he says, “and sure enough, I must have programmed myself.”
The benefits of birdsong
It’s well-documented that being in nature positively impacts mental health and reduces stress, and that includes seeing and hearing birds, according to research published last year in Scientific Reports.
Hearing birdsong elevated feelings of well-being not only in the moment but also hours later, according to a British study. It benefited healthy participants as well as those with depression, and it alleviated feelings of anxiety and paranoia. In North Texas, it’s often possible to hear birds simply by walking outside.
If you want to go deeper, Merlin Bird ID by Cornell Lab (merlin.allaboutbirds.org) can tell you what birds you are hearing, while eBird by Cornell Lab (ebird.org) is a global online database that records what species have been spotted in specific places worldwide. Both applications are free and are downloadable for Android and iOS.
“The eBird app is truly remarkable because bird-watchers will obsessively log what birds they have seen,” says Dallas bird photographer Rajiv Roy. “It’s a useful tool pretty much anywhere in the world. Last summer, we were in Alaska and we looked up hot spots on eBird, and sure enough, those birds were there.”