![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-4226b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"red-tailed-hawk-4226b-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nLanding with a vole, eating it and then going after another one.<\/p>\n
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1\/1600, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, 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 Five days ago in the mountains I spent some time with this young Red-tailed Hawk as “he” hunted from various perches. As evidenced by my shutter speed, camera settings and two water drops dripping off the wire to the left of the fence post it had rained recently so it was overcast and he was in very poor light. So in an effort to get enough SS for action shots and potential flight shots I cranked up my ISO into territory I rarely visit. Even then my SS was marginal at best and it was about to get even slower.<\/p>\n At this tender age his hunting skills were apparently already well developed because he certainly didn’t have any trouble finding and catching this presumed vole (in the talons of his right foot) in the tall, lush grass near a creek. This shot was taken immediately after he landed on the rusty old pipe fencepost which he was about to convert to a dining room table.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/1250, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, 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 When he started to eat the vole he turned a little to his left on the perch so I moved my pickup forward some distance to get a better angle on the bird which accounts for this shot having a very different background than the previous one.<\/p>\n It didn’t take him long to eat the vole and from his behavior I figured that little rodent had only been an appetizer because he appeared to be hunting from the post again. I hoped for takeoff or flight shots if he took off after another one but I was discouraged to see that my SS had dropped even more. I was already significantly above my normal upper ISO limit of 800 and for reasons of depth of field for such a large bird I didn’t want to change my aperture so I decided to just take my chances.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/1250, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, 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 Typically when this species takes off they signal their intention with body language but this one didn’t give me a clue. He had still been turned to my right when he apparently spotted another vole behind and below him so in an instant he twisted on his perch to dive down after it. I like the dramatic takeoff posture including the near-horizontal push-off angle of his legs and feet.<\/p>\n Sharp eyes may have noticed that the perch was vertical in the first two shots but it’s tilted in this one. That was caused by operator error (another way of saying I screwed up). Because I didn’t have my camera level when I took this series the post was actually tilted in all three shots but in the first two I had enough room in the frame to level the image during processing. But because the bird dived down it was too close to the bottom of the frame to level the image without putting his nose right at the bottom frame edge. In the end I decided I’d rather have a tilted post than such a distracting composition.<\/p>\n You’re probably wondering if he caught the second vole. Nope, he missed it so he soon landed on a different post and started hunting again. When he took off from that perch I was able to get some flight shots that I may post sometime down the road.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Landing with a vole, eating it and then going after another one.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/red-tailed-hawk-4299-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"ed-tailed-hawk-4299-ron-dudley\\"")
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