Yesterday I went out triply handicapped for birding: manual focus as usual, my Oly 200mm f/5 instead of my Contax 100-300 or Tamron 400/4, and my 1Ds3 (5fps) instead of my 1Dx2 (14fps).
But I did come home with a fun photo of a blue jay hopping around.
Good job. I too suffer from the manual focus only handicap…makes getting a good capture feel really rewarding.
And here I’m wondering if I can live without the latest and greatest bird eye detection hocus pocus auto focus. Congrats, indeed a nice funny image!
Yeah, it turns photography into a real test of skill which can be fun. Sometimes.
I love birds hopping around and having a great time. The shadows are kind of menacing though. 
Impressive! I also like to use grass or foliage to zone focus, though I use much shorter focal lengths.
Though now I am of course tempted to get an Olympus 200mm f/5… 
It is amazing how cheap they are now.
The 200/4 is similarly cheap, but I got the f/5 for weight.
