Florida Burrowing Owl

Seeing Steve's post of the Little Owl from the UK prompted me to post another of the Burrowing Owls of Florida. These owls while separated by an ocean belong to the same family Athene. The Borrowing Owl of Florida is Athene cunicularia. The male shown is this post is larger and more robust than the female, also the plumage is lighter colored from hours spent in the Florida sun. With the moderators tolerance and forgiveness I would like to post the female in a following post so members can see the difference. Comments and critique welcomed and appreciated. Thank you for viewing.

Nikon D7000
Nikon 80-400mm F/4.5-5.6 VRII AF-S ED shot at 400mm (600mm FFE)
1/500 F/5.6 Matrix Metering + 2/3 EV ISO 1100 AWB, camera on a monopod, distance to the owl 8.91m
Post processed in Lightroom 6 and Photoshop Elements 10
Cropped for composition

This is the female, with the moderators forgiveness.

Well, I'm not a mod but you can have my forgiveness!

2 nice shots, but I much prefer the lighting on the male. I'm over in Florida in a few weeks time and itching for a few hours with these

Mike

Hi Joseph, interesting comparison, as it's the female that is darker & bigger compared to the male with our Owls.

The legs look as long as ours, but far more thinner, but again, that might be because of less feathers, but the same razor sharp talons. I personally much prefer the softer colours of the second posting, the OP looks a bit too saturated and 'over rich', but you know what they are like. Really like the alert, upright pose of the female.

One of the shots I'm looking into and trying to perfect, made me wonder why they would change their flight path in certain instances and all I can think of is because they see their reflection in the lens, I wonder if this is the case here, as my owls are very relaxed when the shutter goes off, WDYT???

cheers
Steve

Grand pair of birds Joe, and I love that subtle hint of somethig in the back. Its impossible to sex our Little owls without the calling tied up to a bird. The colour varies with pairs . Some are both dark and others the opposite. May be something to do with age. The pair I work on has a very light male. Usually one bird is very wary in a pair and the other one tolerant to the level of stupidity !!!
Grands pictures anyway.
John

Quote:

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Its impossible to sex our Little owls without the calling tied up to a bird.

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John, I'm not going to get into a debate with you, but totally disagree, you can based on size & colour, especially when they sit next to each other and then consequently mate, bit of a clue. You then can ID the pair for the future.

If however you want to discuss this then please PM me.

Thanks

Yes you can with the pair you are working on, by seeing which one calls, but colour is generally not conclusive. I probably didn't word it very well.
john

Joe must get myself back to Florida and see if the sun can lighten my plumage, to be a bit more serious both of your Owls look good to me but I do particularly like the stretched female, would be very pleased with both, thanks for giving us a look.

Keith.

I like the pose, eye clarity, sharpness and talons. In the OP I think I see a bit of a magenta cast. Nice images Joe.

Nice image of both, male and female.

Both Image are great , in first image love the BG and Details , Head angle would be more towards to camera will add too much.

Thanks everyone, I appreciated you taking time to view, comment and offer suggestions.

Hi Joseph, no problem posting both sexes for comparison. Good look back pose of the male, and I like the 'grumpy' stare. Good DOF, sharp, and I like the BG.