![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/red-tailed-hawk-1313c-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"red-tailed-hawk-1313c-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nI found him again yesterday morning and this time he was enjoying breakfast.<\/p>\n
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1\/5000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n Soon after I arrived at my shooting location early yesterday morning my old friend the male rufous Red-tailed Hawk was obviously eating. As I watched him feeding through my lens I was surprised by something. While he was eating I couldn’t see his food item but I’d estimate that voles are the prey I see red-tails with about 95% of the time and it typically takes them less than 30 seconds to consume one, sometimes much less.<\/p>\n But he picked at this food item for a very long time which made me suspicious that this time it was something other than a vole, probably something significantly larger. In fact I was so surprised by how long it was taking him I voiced my suspicions out loud.<\/p>\n Much later, when he eventually took off with what he was eating, it turned out that I was right.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/5000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n I don’t know if his food item was originally prey or carrion (possibly road kill) but whatever it was it was much too large to be a vole. Perhaps it was what was left of a larger mammal, or even a bird like a pheasant or a turkey is a possibility. I suspect it’s probably a mammal but I just can’t tell, not for sure anyway.<\/p>\n Not that it matters much I guess. But these kinds of things make me curious. If it’s important to a hawk, and it obviously is, it’s important to me.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Note: It might help to identify the food item if these photos were a little sharper but yesterday both of us were having trouble with heat wave distortion so our photos were softer and had less detail than usual.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I found him again yesterday morning and this time he was already enjoying breakfast when I arrived.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/red-tailed-hawk-1314b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"red-tailed-hawk-1314b-ron-dudley\\"")
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