What is on the Menu

[calfee20]

This guy visits my bird feeder but seeds are not on the menu.
I used the 18-200 at full zoom and had to take quite crop to at least double the size.

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[laurence2]

Wow! That guy is DEFINITELY not looking for any seeds at all! He looks READY to get himself a meal!

The image is nice, you did a good job in cropping and bringing the crop forward to put the hunter into a very good view.

 

[Steaphany]

This poor Barn Owl wasn't looking for dinner, The Tammar Wallabies are happy to hear that, it was checking out my barn for a potential home. The problem was, it could not find a way out. On the evening of the 18th, a friend who helps me here on my ranch came in from feeding the Wallabies saying that an Owl was in the barn. I was first worried about the Owl seeing the Wallabies as dinner, but all the Owl wanted was out.

I got my SD14 and shot several photos. At the time, the only light source was a single heat lamp for the Wallabies and the on SD14 flash. ( I still need to buy a proper Sigma strobe ) I lucked out and had several photos with reasonable focus and exposure:

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The Owl's mate was out side and on the barn roof the whole time, as I could hear the talons against the sheet steel roof as the bird walked about. After shooting the photos, we opened the door on the end of the barn and watched as the Owl flew out.

I've since done some research and found Barn Owls are wonderful at rodent control, meaning my Wallabies are safe, and I want to give these guys a nice home, at least a better home then getting trapped in my barn. I've located a company who makes Barn Owl houses, both for pole mounting and mounting into a barn wall. My ulterior motive is to photograph them and their babies. The Barn Owl houses have rear windows to observe their activities, so I can shoot photos with a better background than what I have in these.

Just last night, I heard the Barn Owls screech as they were out for the evenings mice hunt.

 

[skyrk]

Nice pictures! Here's one I took myself a few days ago. The equipment used was my SD14 with Sigmas 100-300 lens.

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I actually took a few pictures of this kingfisher, but many of them weren't sharp. I still have to practice more, and perhaps buy a good tripod.

 

[Guest .]

Hi ALL,

great pictures above!!

I love kingfishers a lot! They are on my WTH-list ... I never happened to shoot them so far.

As I could take from the EXIFs, you have an 100-300 EX F:4.0! Nice lens indeed!



The other day I happened to shoot this chap!

GREY HERON: SIGMA SD14 / SIGMA 80-400mm EX OS (@400mm/5.6)

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See you with nice pictures

Klaus