First of all you have a very good material to work with. Good crisp sharpness, nicely blurred background, good color combination.
So the bird and the fish are from starters good isolated as the subject in the photo.
The last element is the composition, and it should assist on showing the point of interest. That is definitely not the buttocks of the bird! The action and the interest is about the drop, the fish, the beak and the head of the bird.
Given that it could be the very narrow crop could be an idea, but like yourself I think it's a little to close and crammed. So when looking at the very first image is very pleasing and brings focus to the relevant elements.
Quit sure that a couple of the composition 'rules' would fit that composition as well.