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I don't do a lot of bird photography. My longest lens is a 200 mm, and I'm now shooting a Full Frame sensor, so I don't get the 1.5 multiplier of a DX, though I can do pretty much the same thing by cropping.
We stopped at Ridgefield NWR today, apparently a couple hours before Janice made one of her frequent visits. Deb did most of the shooting, with her 70-300, but I did find a Heron that was willing to oblige me with a couple of close in shots. I filmed a sequence of him taking flight, and found I liked these two shots.
I think it's a matter of not being prepared for them. They are always one step (or should I say flap) ahead of me. The dogs I can anticipate their moves.
I may have the advantage here with my smaller lens. Because they don't fill the frame, it's harder for them to fly out of the frame. Once I get my lens on something as large as a heron, I really have to screw up to lose him.
Of course there is a downside to the small lens. "No, seriously, see those 10 black pixels? That's a Bald Eagle!"
Nice shot of the red-tailed hawk. They are very shy and seldom let you get close enough for a good shot with anything less than a 400mm telephoto lens unless you are inside a car and pull up to one perched on a telephone pole.
When I first moved into my house Red Tailed Hawks were frequent visitors to my backyard. In fact, I was buzzed by one not long after moving in. We sat there watching him out a second story window. He was perched in one of my Fir Trees. He saw me watching him and took off, flying directly at me. At the last moment he pulled up just enough to clear the roof. Deb laughed and said "I think you've been challenged!" We also saw one grab lunch at the bird feeder. No, they don't eat seeds, lunch was "slowest red wing blackbird in the flock".
They're still in the area, I see them around frequently, though they're not often actually in my yard any more, probably due to losing a couple of my tall trees.
Bob, where I once lived I enjoyed looking across the street at what I called the Raptor Tree. It always had some bird of pray on it. I used to watch red-tails, turkey vultures, bald eagles, osprey and even paragrine falcons that had a roost under the bridge. It was always interesting.
