if only

as the sun disappeared I headed for the scrape hide at Far Ings --watching a Snipe it suddenly reacted to something passing over and when I glanced up there was a Bittern flying away---as I had been resting the lens on the hide and had taken it off IS to see if it made any difference to image sharpness I managed to forget to switch it back on as the aforementioned Bittern turned round and flew straight towards me!----in dull light at only 320th second hand held and shaking from the cold I should have done better---the Bittern flew in and landed in front of me but as I glanced up I lost it such was the camo against the reed pile it was sat on---then it virtually ran into the reedbed edge disappearing in seconds---what if the sun had been out, the lens on IS, the bird a bit slower and so on and ------