![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/american-kestrel-3472-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"american-kestrel-3472-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nIt was almost like I called this bird out of the sky.<\/p>\n
Because of health and weather issues I’ve rarely visited my usual bird haunts over the past 11 days but most days we\u00a0do visit\u00a0a local pond just to see if we can get lucky. Usually that’s a very long shot because the only birds down there are domestic ducks, gulls,\u00a0coots and sometimes\u00a0a\u00a0few geese and the light has been crappy anyway. When we made that trip\u00a0yesterday\u00a0morning I remarked to Mia on the way down\u00a0“I think we make about 40 trips to the pond for every time we get lucky”. She agreed.<\/p>\n
And as usual we were skunked at the pond. But we\u00a0often check out the nearby\u00a0Jordan River before we give up so we did that once again and en route\u00a0I said to Mia “Wouldn’t it be nice to find a serendipitous kestrel?”.<\/p>\n
Just over 30 seconds later that’s exactly what happened.<\/p>\n
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1\/640, f\/6.3, ISO 400, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n Immediately after turning into a neighborhood by the river this male American Kestrel almost grazed my windshield as it flew very fast from right to left and made a splat landing in a bush next to the street. I was raising my lens before I braked to a stop but I was already so close to him I could barely fit him in frame vertically. I had about 3 seconds with him in my viewfinder before he took off again and this was the best shot I was able to get.<\/p>\n Though I never did see it I’m quite sure he was chasing a bird that escaped in the thicket of branches. His landing was on the brink of being out of control and he almost impaled himself on the twig sticking up between his wingtips. That twig actually penetrated the base of\u00a0his tail between the two outside feathers and the rest of his tail. Perhaps he was desperate for food to make such an apparently\u00a0long-shot attempt at the presumed bird.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/1250, f\/6.3, ISO 400, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n Almost as soon as he landed he was gone. With that thicket of twigs in front of him the only thing he could do was turn on the perch and leave partially in my direction but as soon as he started to turn and\u00a0take off my photos were amputating some of his body parts and I didn’t have enough shutter speed to get him sharp anyway.<\/p>\n These images give us a good look at the kestrel but they’re far from great shots. The bird is too tight in the frame, I’ve clipped the tail and the setting is busy. But what fun it was to have him land so close to me immediately after I’d almost begged the gods of photography to provide a serendipitous kestrel.<\/p>\n I may have to start praying to those gods more often and maybe next time I won’t be so close to the bird.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It was almost like I called this bird out of the sky.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/american-kestrel-3484-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"american-kestrel-3484-ron-dudley\\"")
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