Friday, March 22, 2013

Windswept and interesting ....

This sparrowhawk spent the afternoon on our garden fence, just two metres from the bird table, maybe wondering why nothing edible showed up. It can't be the smartest of raptors.


Gale force gusts of wind swept across the the garden, ruffling its feathers and, like the rest of us .....



... it kept looking up at the sky, wondering when this wintery spell is going to end.




Then a really savage gust of wind wrecked its composure completely ......


... which necessitated a lot of stretching and preening ..........














...... until it finally decided that it had had enough, and left to try its luck elsewhere.

Within five minutes the blue tits and greenfinches were back on the bird table.....

4 comments:

  1. A wonderful set of images.
    I have yet to get any even half decent pictures of a Kestrel or Sparrow Hawk.
    I have some but they are tame ones and have a wee thing dangling from their leg.
    Do you know how to tell Male and female apart? I know males are smaller. Someone did say females have a bit of orange colour on their beaks.
    Wonderful shots of it.

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  2. Those pictures are wonderful, I am so pleased that you were able to get all of those shots. Such colours in the feathers. The small birds are not so silly are they?

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  3. Hi Adrian, This is a male - the females are larger with brown feathers in place the the male birds grey ones. I was lucky that this one stayed put, giving me time to set up a camera on a tripod. The shutter speed was 1/30 which is why there's blurring when the wind ruffled his feathers, and the lens was an old Sigma 150-500mm. zoom that I bought in a sale, which weighs a ton!

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  4. Thanks toffeeapple - those barred feathers on his breast are lovely, aren't they?

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