Northern Harrier in flight

[Tin Man Lee]

Glad to see the northern harrier again after a couple of months.
I suspect this is a juvenile male northern harrier from the eye color and white below. I may be wrong.
A very windy day today in Los Angeles. Hard to hold my lens still.

Canon 1D Mark IV, 500 F4, 2X III, f11, 1/2500s, ISO 1250, handheld.
LR3, CS5, Nik

C&C welcome.

Tin Man

[James Fuller]

I like the dorsal view and look back pose. Nice choice of crop. I've always had a though time photographing this species. Congrats.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Beautiful shot well exposed and good focus, I like the head turn.

[Doug Brown]

Looks really good for 1000mm! No fun hand holding that much focal length in high wind. It is a male Harrier. Great sharpness and nice eye contact. A slightly better near wing position would have been a plus, but still a good frame!

[dankearl]

I really like the head turn and the BG.
That is a lot of lens, nice job.

[Ofer Levy]

Pretty amazing stuff!!! 1000mm HH !!!

[Tin Man Lee]

Thank you all! Chasing him up and down the hills was no joke. I think my legs are still shaking. I tried the 500 and 1.4x combo quite a few times, but every time when I just climbed a hill and almost caught up, he flew to the next lightning fast and he just appeared too small in the viewfinder. So I decided to give the 2X III a try, provided the relatively good light.

[gail bisson]

Well done Tin Man! I love the look back and wing position. Nice Bg as well.
Gail