Had a neat experience this past weekend while out on my weekly birding and wildlife shoot. I'll note first that bald eagles are exceedingly rare in my area, and in 13 years of bird photography, I've shot exactly 4 eagles with the closest one being about 1/2 mile away, requiring cropping in on what looks like a small dust spot to get any chance at identifying the bird. Ospreys on the other hand are fairly common birds in my area, so I shoot them often - so often in fact, that I often ignore them because I have shot them so much I don't always pay attention to them when they fly overhead. Saturday however, I was walking along, aware that there was an osprey flying behind me at a fair distance - not worth shooting from that far, so I was looking for other birds to shoot. Then the osprey started calling out in constant panicked alarm...enough that I was prompted to turn around and find out why he was so upset and panicked. Looking up, I saw another black and white bird chasing him...initially my thought was another osprey...but on looking closer, the other bird was much larger, and then I noticed the body was black, and only the tail and head white...wait a minute...that's NOT an osprey! So I whipped up the camera and snagged a few shots: It wasn't until I got home and started looking through the photos, cropping in tighter to see the action, that I realized just why the eagle was chasing the osprey...the osprey had made a pretty nice catch of a fish, and had half-eaten it when the eagle must have decided to swoop in and steal it. The osprey took off and was trying to evade the eagle to protect the rest of his meal! It was a cool scene to witness and to photograph, and also let me get a few more eagle shots, much closer than I've ever managed before (though still nothing like you northerners can get with eagles just sitting there a few dozen feet away, posing!). Here are a few more isolated shots of the bald eagle as he was chasing the osprey: Those of you who regularly get to see and shoot eagles might not find these all that exciting. But an eagle down my way is much more rare and hard to see, let alone photograph - sort of like someone in New Jersey or New York spotting an alligator, or an iguana, which I've got dime-a-dozen down here!
Very cool! The only eagle I have seen here (other than in a cage at a zoo) was also a half mile off, so cropping was all I could do to identify it.
Exactly...of my previous cropped eagle sightings, one was a juvenile, which I didn't even realize was an eagle until I cropped - but even then, it was barely recognizable, and not exactly something you'd be proud to display or print...ID only. I wish I lived in a more eagle-intense area!
The sad thing is that I am not too far from them and have not taken a trip to see them in a long time. I think there were more eagles at Forsythe this year too.
there are eagles at forsythe but with them being closed I cant get to them. last year I saw 7 in one day there. there are some in Port Republic John and weather permitting going to look for them tomorrow after checking on the wood dcks
