Joshua Trees, A Red-tailed Hawk And Waiting For The Moon
My recent camping trip to the Mojave Desert of southwestern Utah was slow on birds but I didn’t come home “skunked” either.
Rock Squirrels
Today’s post is a change of pace for me involving Rock Squirrels, my own ignorance and my evolution as a nature photographer.
A Digestive Surprise For A Young Swainson’s Hawk
I believe this juvenile Swainson’s Hawk was taken by surprise by what it found in its mouth.
Northern Harriers Playing With Toys
In a recent post I documented “play” in Northern Harriers. Two days ago I photographed two of them playing – with each other and with “toys”.
An Acrobatic Red-tailed Hawk
Raptors sometimes pull some pretty crazy maneuvers during take-off (the last 9 images in this post are sequential with no images in the sequence left out).
Montana Merlin In The Fog
Last month I posted a few images of this Merlin in the fog. For subtle reasons this may be my favorite from the entire session with the bird.
Pied-billed Grebe – An Entertaining Diving Technique
Pied-billed Grebes use several different diving techniques but the one called “gradual sinking” is certainly the most entertaining to watch.
Sandhill Cranes (displaying, feather staining and a wildlife spectacle)
I usually have opportunities to photograph Sandhill Cranes on my visits to Montana’s Centennial valley and this past trip in early September was no exception.
Curious Swainson’s Hawk Checking Me Out In Flight
Occasionally soaring raptors fly in quite close to observers and I’m convinced that sometimes it’s simply a matter of curiosity.
Northern Harrier “Playing”
Play has been well documented in some bird species and I believe I photographed that behavior in a Northern Harrier this week. This bird was too far away for quality images but I think the behavior is well documented in the photographs. I first spotted this hawk on an ugly metal fence post but as soon as I stopped my pickup to watch it through my lens the wary bird took off. Almost immediately it performed a spectacular and classic harrier mid-air maneuver by changing directions and pouncing on something in the grasses. I presumed it to be a vole. For about two minutes the bird continually struggled, wrestled and pounced on something I couldn’t see. The activity was quite frenetic and I took many photos of it. As I watched through my lens I wondered if the harrier was trying to avoid being bitten by a vole or even a larger rodent. Eventually the harrier took off with its “prey”, which turned out to be dried cow poop. Cow pies are common in this area because refuge managers run cattle there in the summer in an attempt to control invasive phragmites (personally I’m not a fan of cattle on public lands but that’s another story…). The harrier carried the cow pie only a few feet… before dropping it. Whether that was done deliberately or not I don’t know but I suspect that it was because in the image just before this one (just as the pie…