In a scene that lays bare the harsh realities of the wild, two male mallards have driven a female beneath the surface. Fueled by the urgency of reproduction, their instincts override restraint. This is not courtship as we would know it, but rather a desperate scramble for genetic legacy\u2014nature\u2019s darker side, playing out in the dappled light of a lily-covered pond.<\/p>\n
Anas platyrhynchos<\/em><\/p>\n Shot with: In a scene that lays bare the harsh realities of the wild, two male mallards have driven a female beneath the surface. Fueled by the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-action","post_format-post-format-image"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/IMG_8038.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":235,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234\/revisions\/235"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lensbymatthi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nCanon EOS 6D + Sigma 150-600mm f\/5.0-6.3
\n600mm | 1\/4000 | f\/6.3 | ISO6400<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"