Final Frame: Learning Curve

Wildlife photographer captures a tufted titmouse chick taking a tumble while learning to fly

WHILE TESTING ITS WINGS last May, this 3-week-old black-crested titmouse became stuck momentarily in a notch in a backyard planter. “A week earlier, it left its nesting box in an oak tree on our property, and I was able to watch it develop daily through my office window,” says Texas photographer Howard Cheek. Within a few days after he made this image, Cheek adds, the young bird and its nest mates “were darting about our yard as expertly as the adults.”

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