{"id":23151,"date":"2014-04-09T05:37:26","date_gmt":"2014-04-09T11:37:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=23151"},"modified":"2014-04-09T05:37:26","modified_gmt":"2014-04-09T11:37:26","slug":"meadowlarks-take-offs-and-armpits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2014\/04\/09\/meadowlarks-take-offs-and-armpits\/","title":{"rendered":"Meadowlarks, Take-offs And “Armpits”"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I’m photographing Western Meadowlarks at take-off there’s always one flight posture I hope I don’t<\/em> get.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"western<\/p>\n

\u00a01\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 640, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Yesterday morning on Antelope Island\u00a0this meadowlark was perched atop sagebrush stems in early, warm light.\u00a0 After a few close-ups I removed my teleconverter and prepared for launch.\u00a0 ISO 640 was necessary to get the shutter speed I wanted in this relatively\u00a0low\u00a0light.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"western<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a01\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 640, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

As the bird lifted off I got this\u00a0one shot that I like a lot.<\/p>\n

Whenever I’m photographing meadowlarks in flight I’m always hoping to catch the wings in the down (as opposed to up)\u00a0position because of a peculiar characteristic I’ve noticed about their under-wing plumage.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"western<\/p>\n

1\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Their “armpit” plumage (axillaries) nearly always seems to be so thin and sparse that pink, naked skin is visible, which I find unflattering and distracting (this photo was also taken yesterday morning on the island).\u00a0 When I first noticed this trait a few years ago, in my ignorance I just assumed they were all young birds or molting.\u00a0 But it seems that virtually every time I catch the wings up, no matter the age of the bird or the time of the year, the axillaries are always so sparse that pink skin shows through.<\/p>\n

This is something I haven’t noticed in any other species (except in young, recently fledged birds).<\/p>\n

All of which makes me wonder if it’s a trait of the species or my observational skills are lacking.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I’m photographing Western Meadowlarks at take-off there’s always one flight posture I hope I don’t get.<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23153,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,5,6,334,370],"tags":[31,1949,1948,187,669,453,311,323],"class_list":["post-23151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antelope-island","category-bird-oddities","category-bird-photography-methods","category-birds","category-western-meadowlarks","tag-antelope-island-2","tag-armpit","tag-axillaries","tag-iso","tag-sturnella-neglecta","tag-teleconverter","tag-utah-2","tag-western-meadowlark"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/western-meadowlark-2427-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-61p","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}