2205_1110 Northern Harrier
A male Northern Harrier - "the grey ghost" - banks over a buffaloberry thicket along the Frenchman River. In early spring the branches are not fully leafed out; in another week they will be, and thus offer better concealment to small nesting birds. By then, the harrier will be working the open fields, searching for rodents and other small mammals. In the fall they add fat, nutritious, adult grasshoppers to their diet. We have a lot of those this year, so maybe I'll be lucky and get another decent shot before the snow arrives.
I shot this more or less at eye level, from the rolling red Toyota blind. The Frenchman is a sunken river that carves a long, winding channel across the prairie. The banks tend to be steep. It isn't wide in most places, and certainly looks nothing like the big rivers I grew up with in eastern Canada. Its depth ranges from a few inches to twelve feet or more, depending on many interrelated factors. In winter, it provides shelter from wind and driving snow for many wildlife species, and a protected travel corridor when frozen. One of the main survival keys here in winter is getting out of the wind, and the river allows moose, coyotes, grouse, and many other critters to do just that.
No special technique used here - just stop the car, roll down the window, find the focus, and shoot. I did a little noise reduction in Topaz DeNoise and minor upscaling in ON1 Resize. Small tweaks.
The prairie raptor series continues tomorrow...
Photographed in Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2022 James R. Page - all rights reserved.
2205_1110 Northern Harrier
A male Northern Harrier - "the grey ghost" - banks over a buffaloberry thicket along the Frenchman River. In early spring the branches are not fully leafed out; in another week they will be, and thus offer better concealment to small nesting birds. By then, the harrier will be working the open fields, searching for rodents and other small mammals. In the fall they add fat, nutritious, adult grasshoppers to their diet. We have a lot of those this year, so maybe I'll be lucky and get another decent shot before the snow arrives.
I shot this more or less at eye level, from the rolling red Toyota blind. The Frenchman is a sunken river that carves a long, winding channel across the prairie. The banks tend to be steep. It isn't wide in most places, and certainly looks nothing like the big rivers I grew up with in eastern Canada. Its depth ranges from a few inches to twelve feet or more, depending on many interrelated factors. In winter, it provides shelter from wind and driving snow for many wildlife species, and a protected travel corridor when frozen. One of the main survival keys here in winter is getting out of the wind, and the river allows moose, coyotes, grouse, and many other critters to do just that.
No special technique used here - just stop the car, roll down the window, find the focus, and shoot. I did a little noise reduction in Topaz DeNoise and minor upscaling in ON1 Resize. Small tweaks.
The prairie raptor series continues tomorrow...
Photographed in Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2022 James R. Page - all rights reserved.