Photographer captures bird appearing to blow ‘cigar-style’ smoke rings

By Adam Dutton via SWNS

Stunning wintry pictures show a singing chaffinch blowing out "cigar-style" smoke rings on a misty morning.

Wildlife photographer Andrew Fusek-Peters snapped the chilly bird in his garden in Shropshire, UK, while it rested on a log on Monday morning, Jan. 23.

A tiny stream of foggy vapor can be seen coming from the chaffinch's beak as it began to sing in the frosty morning air, as temperatures plummeted to -1 degrees C (30.2 F).

Andrew, who has been photographing birds for eight years, said he's never captured such an image before and it was only made possible by the luck of the light.

He had been snapping garden birds from his kitchen window when the ideal sunlight allowed him to get the unique shot.

Andrew, 57, said: “It doesn’t look real but just for a few seconds it was. The light has to be right because you can easily miss it.

“I've been photographing birds for eight years but I’ve never seen it before. I have probably taken 800,000 photos of birds and this is the only one of these I’ve got.

"I was lucky to get the whole sequence, from when it breathes out to when it disappears. It looks like cigar smoke."

“I got it while shooting birds in my garden through my kitchen window. It’s got to be zero or minus degrees at that point to actually get it.

“It's a really difficult shot as it’s over in a couple of seconds. It's the light which makes it and people often don’t look for that."