![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/short-eared-owl-8646b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"short-eared-owl-8646b-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nEight days ago I had an absolute blast photographing fighting Short-eared Owls, even though that was the morning the owls were always backlit or sidelit. This morning it was my intention to post a series of over a dozen photos of them performing their aerial dogfights but last evening I quickly learned that doing so was going to be more than I could handle.<\/p>\n
I won’t go into all of the unpleasant details, other than to say that I’ve heard from others that the second and third day after major surgery are the worst and now I believe them. I’ve been laid low by pain and lack of sleep and sitting at my computer has been a challenge so a long post like I planned has to be put on the back burner.<\/p>\n
But last night the pain finally began to subside and I actually got some sleep so this morning I couldn’t resist posting a teaser.<\/p>\n
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1\/6400, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n I believe the fighting owls were both adult males but it’s possible that they were a mated pair that were only sparring with each other. Whatever the case, getting them both in frame and reasonably sharp was a challenge. Here the owl at bottom has turned upside down, presumably to present its talons defensively to the incoming bird.<\/p>\n The two owls attacked each other in the air repeatedly. After an encounter they’d separate and then come at each other again. The trick was timing my shots so I had both birds in the frame. Sometimes I succeeded and more often I failed.<\/p>\n But it sure was fun and it lasted long enough to give me a significant amount of valuable practice with my relatively new camera.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Eight days ago I had an absolute blast photographing fighting Short-eared Owls.<\/p>\n