Can't Wait

Our American Goldfinches just can't wait until our sunflowers are ripe. This male is eating the seeds before they fully mature. I always love to plant sunflowers in the garden. I have some for me for cutting flowers and some for the birds to eat. Usually, the sunflowers drop their leaves and droop their heads, then the seeds fully mature. Sometimes the goldfinches get to them first.
What I love about this image is the soft, painterly quality, produced by the lower light conditions and the fact the photo was taken from a distance. Shot with the Canon Mark II, 300 mm IS, with 1.4 teleconverter at 200 ISO, f 6.3, 1/200 sec.
I often think, if John James Audubon were alive today, he would be using a Canon Mark III, long lenses and Photoshop. The digital tools are a kind of bird art of today.