![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/rough-legged-hawk-3472-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"rough-legged-hawk-3472-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nAnd fighting lunacy with lunacy… using birds.<\/p>\n
We’re lucky enough to have pretty good numbers of Rough-legged Hawks this winter and in the last few weeks I’ve photographed a fair number of them but decent takeoff and flight shots have eluded me. They always took off away from me or something else went wrong.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
1\/4000, f\/6.3, ISO 400, 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 But two days ago this adult male roughie at Bear River MBR rewarded me for the delay, if not for my patience. He was perched on the left side of the sign with his back to me so I figured he’d take off away from me. But immediately after takeoff he performed a twisting, in-flight maneuver that gave me a great look at his dorsal surfaces, including his flared tail, and his head turn was just about perfect.<\/p>\n I always hope for these twisting takeoffs but they don’t happen very often and when they do I usually screw something up – most often with clipped body parts. So I was pleased to have nearly everything come together for this shot.<\/p>\n I say “nearly” for two reasons. At this point on the cold morning I was still having a little trouble with atmospheric heat waves interfering with the sharpness of my photos so the hawk isn’t tack sharp. And I’d have preferred the perch to be a natural one instead of a sign but I’m still pleased with the photo.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I wanted to see what it would look like without the sign so for this version I removed it. I actually prefer the first version because the sign provides context that visually explains the dynamics of the quick and twisting takeoff. Perspective matters.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n OK, I’m going to shift gears and end this post with different kind of “twist”.<\/p>\n In my view conspiracy theories have become one of the primary banes of existence in modern America and when one of them involves birds it gets my attention. Many of my readers have probably seen evidence of the “Birds Aren’t Real<\/a><\/span><\/span>” movement on social media and billboards in major American cities and if you’re like me you probably initially dismissed it as just another crackpot conspiracy theory.<\/p>\n But there’s a clever, if convoluted, twist to the Birds Aren’t Real movement that has only recently been revealed. It might be described as “fighting lunacy with lunacy” or “Gen Z\u2019s attempt to upend a rabbit hole with absurdism”.<\/p>\n The story is too complex and delicious to explain here but this link to a recent NY Times article fills in the blanks. If you’ve already reached your limit of NY Times articles you may not be able to open the link. But it’s worth a try.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/rough-legged-hawk-3472-version-2-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"rough-legged-hawk-3472-version-2-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n