{"id":37071,"date":"2016-01-31T06:10:07","date_gmt":"2016-01-31T13:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=37071"},"modified":"2016-01-31T06:37:06","modified_gmt":"2016-01-31T13:37:06","slug":"juvenile-swainsons-hawk-landing-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2016\/01\/31\/juvenile-swainsons-hawk-landing-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Juvenile Swainson’s Hawk Landing Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Landing on relatively small elevated perches must be one of the more difficult skills\u00a0young raptors must learn.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

Last September I spent time with two sibling juvenile Swainson’s Hawks near Monida, Montana\u00a0as they were still honing their flight and landing skills. They spent most of their\u00a0time hanging out together in the same general area and waiting for their parents to bring them food. They could fly well but landing was another story altogether because each perch presented a different set of conditions and\u00a0challenges. While they were waiting they often practiced takeoffs and landings from\/on power poles, fence posts and the ground. One of them had an injured leg (the bird on the left in this photo) so it spent more time on the ground than its sibling did.<\/p>\n

Here the hawk on the right is preparing to take off and land on the post on the left. I thought it would be visually interesting for viewers to see every shot I got from takeoff to landing so there are 17 images in this post. From this point on I’ll provide very little text – the images speak for themselves.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

Notice the intense focus of the hawk on the top of the post from the very beginning and throughout the process.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

Contact! At this point we can see two claws of the right foot on top of the post but the bird’s flight speed was slow and its “aim” was a little low\u00a0so it apparently didn’t have enough momentum for its inertia to carry its center of gravity over the post so…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

the bird dropped down a little on the post…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

and had to struggle as it\u00a0used its wings and feet\u00a0to pull its body up onto the post.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

Even when it got up there it was still unstable and had to use its wings for balance.<\/p>\n

I’m sure you noticed that the injured sibling watched the entire process intently. Maybe it learned something by doing so…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"swainson's<\/p>\n

Once the young bird stabilized on the post it spent quite a while there and soon after I took this photo it leisurely stretched both wings. Notice that the other bird is now laying down\u00a0on the ground in deference to its injured leg. It often did\u00a0just that, though the other bird never did. There’s more about the injured sibling here<\/a> if you have the interest.<\/p>\n

I realize that this is a huge blog\u00a0post (17 images) and I hope that didn’t cause loading problems for my readers. But I thought there would be interest in seeing the entire process from takeoff to landing in this very short flight.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

Notes:<\/em><\/p>\n