{"id":49951,"date":"2017-07-14T05:50:12","date_gmt":"2017-07-14T11:50:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=49951"},"modified":"2017-07-14T05:50:12","modified_gmt":"2017-07-14T11:50:12","slug":"prairie-falcon-trying-to-carry-too-much-weight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2017\/07\/14\/prairie-falcon-trying-to-carry-too-much-weight\/","title":{"rendered":"Prairie Falcon Trying To Carry Too Much Weight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Subtitle: Mia’s Pit Stop Prairie Falcon.<\/p>\n

Yesterday morning while cruising the remote back roads of the Centennial Valley we needed to stop for one of Mia’s rare pit stops. While waiting in the driver’s seat for her to complete her mission I noticed a fairly large faraway bird that was usually completely hidden in the tall grasses but every few seconds it would jump into the air and attempt to fly but almost immediately flutter back down into the grasses and disappear again.<\/p>\n

From that great distance I thought it was either a Sage Grouse or a Prairie Falcon but no matter its ID the behavior was weird and my impulse was to stomp on the gas in order to get close enough to see what was going on and possibly document some interesting behavior. But of course I had to wait until the deed was done behind my pickup so I hollered “Hurry, Mia – bird!” back to her. Mia KNOWS<\/em> what that means so in a heartbeat she was once again in the back seat (with her pants still in disarray…) and we were on our way down the dirt\u00a0road.<\/p>\n

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At first this is all we could see through our lenses – a faraway Prairie Falcon peeking back at us through the grasses. I wondered if it had been fighting with another bird and\/or was possibly\u00a0injured but when it eventually attempted to take off once again the explanation for the strange behavior became clear.<\/p>\n

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The falcon had scored a “gopher” as prey – actually a Richardson’s Ground Squirrel and the rodent was so heavy the bird couldn’t fly with it. The same thing happened each time it attempted to lift off\u00a0 – the falcon could only gain enough elevation to barely skim over the tops of the grasses but within a few dozen yards the weight of the prey would drag it down again and it would plop back onto the ground. Eventually both bird and prey were so far away that I drove off and left it in peace.<\/p>\n

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This is a Richardson’s Ground Squirrel.\u00a0Large ones can weigh as much as 1.65 lbs. so many would be too large for a 1.6 lb. Prairie Falcon to carry. Apparently this gopher was smaller but the falcon had still bitten off more than it could chew.<\/p>\n

These first two photos are only of documentary quality of course but as always I love documenting behaviors like this.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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

Subtitle: Mia’s Pit Stop Prairie Falcon.<\/p>\n

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