Note: Fair warning – the second\u00a0photo in this sequence is slightly graphic so sensitive folks may want to avoid scrolling further than the first image.\u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n <\/p>\n
![\"red-tailed](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-6764-ron-dudley.jpg\")
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\u00a01\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM +1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nI photographed this juvenile Red-tailed Hawk yesterday morning near Farmington Bay as it prepared to eat a vole it had just caught.\u00a0 Its crop already appears to be bulging and it hasn’t yet started feeding\u00a0on this rodent so\u00a0hunting is apparently good.\u00a0 The dark seed heads in the background may be distracting for some but I like the haughty, almost cocky pose from the hawk.<\/p>\n
Usually when I see red-tails feeding on voles they tear them into a few\u00a0relatively large chunks and swallow each piece individually.\u00a0 This bird\u00a0chose a different tack.<\/p>\n
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![\"red-tailed](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-6835-ron-dudley.jpg\")
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\u00a0\u00a01\/2500, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\nIt opened the vole, consumed a few tiny bits and then, like I pull a sock off of my foot, it turned the rodent inside-out by pulling it between its beak and one of its feet.\u00a0 It was a pretty nifty trick to watch and photograph.\u00a0 I’ll spare you more gory images of the process\u00a0but as soon as it was accomplished…<\/p>\n
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![\"red-tailed](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-6870-ron-dudley.jpg\")
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\u00a01\/2500, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\nit swallowed the carcass relatively whole, though certainly transformed.\u00a0 The hawk then\u00a0briefly cleaned its\u00a0feet, roused and took off.<\/p>\n
I’m already\u00a0looking forward to a good “raptor winter” with a variety of hawk, falcon and eagle species.\u00a0 Partly for my sake, but mostly for theirs, I hope I’m not disappointed.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I photographed this juvenile Red-tailed Hawk yesterday morning near Farmington Bay as it prepared to eat a vole it had just caught.<\/p>\n
Note: Fair warning – the second photo in this sequence is slightly graphic so sensitive folks may want to avoid scrolling further than the first image. <\/p>\n
Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26644,"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":[334,392,450],"tags":[452,2232,2231,190,256,451,315],"class_list":["post-26643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-birds","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","category-red-tailed-hawks","tag-buteo-jamaicensis","tag-feeding-technique","tag-great-salt-lake-valley","tag-juvenile","tag-prey","tag-red-tailed-hawk","tag-vole"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-6764-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-6VJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26643","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=26643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26643\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}