{"id":45875,"date":"2017-02-13T06:14:19","date_gmt":"2017-02-13T13:14:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=45875"},"modified":"2017-02-13T06:28:12","modified_gmt":"2017-02-13T13:28:12","slug":"rough-legged-hawk-on-a-rabbit-kill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/13\/rough-legged-hawk-on-a-rabbit-kill\/","title":{"rendered":"Rough-legged Hawk On A Rabbit Kill"},"content":{"rendered":"

I carry a second camera and lens combo with me whenever I’m in the field. Yesterday it paid off handsomely.<\/p>\n

When we found this Rough-legged Hawk on a rabbit kill yesterday morning in Box Elder County I didn’t have the opportunity (for complicated reasons) to maneuver my pickup into an appropriate distance from them for the lens I was using. I was simply too close for my 500mm lens (probably even with the teleconverter removed). So I reached over the seat and grabbed my shorter zoom lens with another camera body attached and the bird gave me\u00a0only a few\u00a0seconds with it before it took off.<\/p>\n

Without the spare\u00a0body and lens all I’d have\u00a0is a few images that were too tight on the hawk and rabbit – if I was lucky. If I wasn’t lucky the hawk would have flown off by the time I got my tc removed and the camera reattached to the lens.<\/p>\n

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1\/5000, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon 7D, Canon EF 100-400mm f\/4.5-5.6L IS II USM @ 400mm, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

This is one of the few\u00a0shots I got before the hawk lifted off. Some folks don’t appreciate photos that include partially eaten prey but for me these images epitomize raw nature in a wild and natural\u00a0setting. They aren’t too gory for my tastes and I\u00a0appreciate the entire scene with good light on\u00a0both bird and rabbit, both of them\u00a0positioned between the two sagebrush, excellent exposure on the snow and enough depth of\u00a0field to get both bird and prey sharp (even though my camera settings aren’t ideal for the situation).<\/p>\n

And I had enough room in the image to crop to a composition that pleases me.<\/p>\n

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1\/5000, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon 7D, Canon EF 100-400mm f\/4.5-5.6L IS II USM @ 400mm, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

The hawk never did give me much pose variety but when it turned its head to this angle it put better light on the face so this is my favorite image of the two.<\/p>\n

I’m unsure if the rabbit was road kill or prey killed by this hawk or another raptor (both eagle species and Red-tailed Hawks are common in the area). The rabbit was perhaps 15′ off the road (how did it get that far off the road if it was road kill?)\u00a0in deep snow and it didn’t look mangled like most road kill so I suspect it\u00a0may have been\u00a0killed as prey. Rough-legged Hawks normally prefer live prey but they will feed on carrion when the ground is snow-covered which makes their preferred prey less available. And roughies are known to kill rabbits but the only documentation I could find of them doing so was with rabbit prey\u00a0that is\u00a0young and\/or small (tundra or snowshoe hares).<\/p>\n

From Birds of North America Online: “Rabbits can be important winter food, primarily as carrion, and particularly after snow when small mammals are less available”.<\/em><\/p>\n

Prey or road kill, I’m glad I had my spare camera and lens along on this trip.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I carry a second camera and lens combo with me whenever I’m in the field. Yesterday it paid off handsomely.<\/p>\n

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