Juvenile Red-tailed Hawk (I think)

[Michael Lloyd]

I'm never 100% sure on Hawk id...

1DMkIII
600 f4L IS w/1.4x TC

ISO- 400
1/1600
f5.6

[Manos Papadomanolakis]

I really like the angle and the pose!

[Arthur Morris]

Love the underwing detail and the fact that you got the whole bird in the frame. SH and good EXP. Was the bird on prey? (Yes to juvie red-tail.) You chose a good perspective with the rather tall grass.

[Shawn Marques]

Hi Michael. I like the spread wings as it is in the grass- a good indication that it has prey (or thinks it does) and is trying to counterbalance itself in the struggle. My guess- only because I have seen this behavior with my wife's rth with prey. BTW, the juvies have light colored, striped tails, which turn red after the first year moult. But the eyes take longer to change from that straw color to dark brown- so this may be a young adult. At what age do they turn color? I dunno. Tory is about 1.5 years old, and he still has light eyes.

[Robert O'Toole]

Awesome wing position Michael. Very sharp and I like the catchlight. Good work fitting everything in the frame as Artie mentioned.

Toning down the bright grass in the BG would make the image even better.

Robert

[Michael Lloyd]

The bird thought it was on prey. Shawn explained it perfectly. I have a few dozen shots of the bird in various positions as it tried to figure out if it had actually caught anything or not. I left before I he or I figured that out.

The "grass" is actually rice stubble. This time of year is a good time to ride around the rice fields looking for hawks, geese, etc. and today was the first chance that I've had to put any effort into hunting for hawks. This guy was generous with his time :)