{"id":1674,"date":"2012-02-21T17:09:23","date_gmt":"2012-02-21T23:09:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/?p=1674"},"modified":"2012-02-21T17:09:23","modified_gmt":"2012-02-21T23:09:23","slug":"three-raptor-species-in-one-afternoon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/2012\/02\/21\/three-raptor-species-in-one-afternoon\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Raptor Species in One Afternoon…"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is almost impossible to edit the thousands of photos one accumulates over the winter season.\u00a0 This week, I got back to the Bosque del Apache photos from December.\u00a0 Then, I\u00a0drove out to the Santa Clara Ranch hawk blind yesterday.\u00a0 The photos you will see in this newsletter show a few more of the New Mexico birds plus a surprise from the hawk blind.<\/p>\n

Deep south Texas has had quite a few Mexico bird sightings this winter.\u00a0 Two weeks ago, Alan Williams invited me to his habitat in Pharr\u00a0where a female crimson-collared grosbeak (a Mexican species) was wintering.\u00a0 The bird was certainly cooperative, but I do wish these things would travel in pairs.\u00a0 The males are always tough to\u00a0see north of the border.<\/p>\n

I hear there are lots of ducks\u00a0in the Laguna Madre and around\u00a0the Rockport area right now.\u00a0 If the weather cooperates, I hope to\u00a0hear for Rockport again next week.<\/p>\n

\"Female<\/a>
Female crimson-collared grosbeak eating potato tree fruit.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n
\"Harris's<\/a>
Harris's hawk landing on perch at Santa Clara Ranch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This Harris’s hawk landing sequence should have been the highlight of my day yesterday, but there was a big surprise awaiting me and the Harris family.\u00a0 Both shots were taken with the Canon 1D Mark III, Canon 100-400 IS zoom lens at 400 mm at ISO 800, 1\/2000 @ f 5.6, hand-held.\u00a0 I find that I have more control to keep flying birds in the viewfinder when I am free of the tripod.\u00a0 Of course, this requires a high shutter speed to eliminate camera shake,\u00a0 but I\u00a0keep the speed high\u00a0anyway to stop the birds in flight.<\/p><\/div>\n

\n
\"Harris's<\/a>
Harris's hawk landing<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A few minutes after shooting the landing sequence above, a white-tailed hawk swooped in on the perch to get a share of the beef kidney tied at the lower end of the perch branch.\u00a0 It was my first time to see whitetails eating something they didn’t catch alive.<\/p>\n

\n
\"White-tailed<\/a>
White-tailed Hawk landing on perch at the Santa Clara Ranch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\"Although<\/a>
Although larger than the Harris's hawk, this white-tailed hawk was eventually chased away by the smaller, more agressive birds.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I cloned away the chunk of beef kidney tied to this limb under the hawk’s talons.<\/p><\/div>\n

\n
\"Audubon's<\/a>
Audubon's oriole waiting for a turn on the beef kidney at the hawk perch on Santa Clara Ranch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\"Crested<\/a>
Crested Caracara at sunset on the Santa Clara Ranch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As the sun was setting yesterday, this crested caracara came to the hawk perch on Santa Clara Ranch.\u00a0 The caracaras waited at a distance until the Harris’s hawk and white-tailed hawk were gone for the day.\u00a0 Then, they moved in to clean up any remaining scraps of food.<\/p><\/div>\n

I was putting my gear away last evening when the sun popped out from behind the “Mexico” cloud at sunset.\u00a0 At the same time, this crested caracara landed near the blind.\u00a0 Without checking my settings, I got the bird in the viewfinder, focused and shot 4 images.\u00a0\u00a0It\u00a0flushed as I began shooting and, fortunately,\u00a0there was\u00a0enough shutter speed to stop its movement in the first two frames.\u00a0 Canon 7D, Canon 500 mm IS lens, ISO 640, 1\/500 second @ f 5.<\/div>\n
\n
\"Sandhill<\/a>
Sandhill crane landing at the roost pond in front of mountain shadows at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\"Sandhill<\/a>
Sandhill crane pair landing in roost pond.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\"Snow<\/a>
Snow geese with landing gear down.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I like making images with two or more birds doing something together.\u00a0 Whether some critics might say, “Oh, those birds’ bodies are merged in this photo” means nothing to me.\u00a0 If I like it, I like it and I love this shot.<\/p><\/div>\n

\n
\"Snow<\/a>
Snow goose landing with sandhill cranes in a Bosque cornfield.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n
\"Typical<\/a>
Typical sunrise on a New Mexico marsh in December.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

There it is.\u00a0 I hope you enjoy some of these photos.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n

Larry<\/em><\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is almost impossible to edit the thousands of photos one accumulates over the winter season.\u00a0 This week, I got back to the Bosque del Apache photos from December.\u00a0 Then, I\u00a0drove out to the Santa Clara Ranch hawk blind yesterday.\u00a0 The photos you will see in this newsletter show a few more of the New … Continue reading Three Raptor Species in One Afternoon…<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-newsletter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1674"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1674\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1691,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1674\/revisions\/1691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}