Tanx all for comments/concerns! Oddly enough despite the several comments, there was actually absolutely no sharpening done here. I'd say the culprits are several fold:
--Primary culprit was the terribly harsh lighting...stopping down turned the water the lovely creamy blue/black, but...
--Texture of the rough beak/head area lit harshly with strong highlights and contrasty shadows gives an appearance of more sharpening than feasibly necessary...especially in contrast to the soft bed of feathers and smooth water...
--and finally to a very mild degree...shot with sharpy L-series glass...
I bracketed the shot and the darker shot a stop down had blended the heron too much with the water without much contrast...in fact, you can still see the blending down the back of the neck in this shot despite being a stop up.
On the whole I didn't mind the sharp contrast between the water/heron since it really matched the rather mean temperment of this particular one! I've lived in Chicago most of my life and I had NEVER seen a heron in this area EVER...so I was enthralled just to be able to get this shot in a local pond!
Waterfowl are hard to capture... they hang out in bright areas with dark plumage... or dark areas with white plumage... I like the composition and the expression... the color of the beak is very nice. Overall, I have a hard time getting past the blockyness of the head. Not sure what or why it is that way, but there you have it. Good luck.
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