Fight!! Fight!!

[David Salem]

My good buddy Glenn and I headed to the central plains of the US to shoot Prairie Chickens on the lek last spring. We had a great time and had two good days of shooting with nice light.
These are Greater Prairie Chickens, as opposed the the smaller Lessers. They are jacked up on testosterone as they strut and battle for the right to breed with the females.
This was a pretty cool frame as the bird below bites at the other as they launch in the air. I wish for a better left wing position on the upper bird but the foot is clear and thankfully so is his head. Even though they fought a lot, it was very difficult to get a frame where both heads were visible and sharp, so I was pretty happy to come away with this one. Hope you like it.

D5---600mm---f6.3---ss1/3200th---ISO640---Handheld from jeep@8:15am---35% crop

Thanks as always for looking and for your input. I appreciate it.

David

[arash_hazeghi]

sweet light and dynamic action takes this to the top

[dankearl]

I have been waiting for this.. Great action, I especially like the talon defending the strike. Nice light, great BG.
Maybe due to instagram and probably has nothing to do with your decision, but I have become a fan of 4X5 crops.
This is close to that, I like it.

[Jan van Holten]

Great action shot. Beautiful birds turn over to little devil's, kicking and biting.

[John Mack]

Looks great. Neat to see that bird biting the other one.

[Mike Poole]

Great action frame, that's what photographing the lek is all about!

Mike

[gail bisson]

Simply superb action.
Is the color of the sky like that IRL?
I would reduce the overall brightness of the image slightly as well as the contrast.
I have never seen these birds in real life and wonder if the whites are supposed to have that grey tinge?
Sounds like I am picking on you but I'm not. Just trying to figure things out!
Gail

[David Salem]

Thanks for the comments everyone. I'm glad you like it.

[David Salem]

Simply superb action.
Is the color of the sky like that IRL?
I would reduce the overall brightness of the image slightly as well as the contrast.
I have never seen these birds in real life and wonder if the whites are supposed to have that grey tinge?
Sounds like I am picking on you but I'm not. Just trying to figure things out!
Gail

Thanks Gail,

The sky was not manipulated at all. I sometimes boost the blues in the sky if I feel it needs it, but this was just the natural color of the nice early morning Colorado sky.
Yes that is the color of the whites in the underwings of the chicken. They are not clean white at all and are more of a dirty white with Gray tones. You can see the whiter part of the 1st half of the primaries which is much whiter than the underwing.
You can scroll down and look at a incoming flight shot from Kevin Hince and see the same color under the wings, even though his image is very yellow.

Thanks as always for your input and please stay safe!