A Northern Harrier Kind Of Morning

Normally I avoid doing back to back posts on the same species but I went out shooting immediately after I published that last post and surprisingly it turned out to be a heckuva harrier morning.  I’ve mentioned  before that I usually have my best luck with harriers in the middle of winter, but yesterday I found two cooperative birds.

 

 1/1600, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

This beauty was hunkered down for a break from hunting and let me get surprisingly close.  It was early morning, the light was warm, and the bird posed for me for a long time.  I chose to post this almost direct look from the hawk for a reason – because out of all those images, this one shows the unique harrier facial disc best.

A facial disc is a concave arrangement of feathers on the face of some birds (most notably owls) that forms a circular parabaloid that collects sound waves and redirects them toward the ears.  In harriers the disc is less prominent than in owls, but larger in relative size because it extends to the neck, so it is commonly referred to as a facial ruff, rather than a disc.   The large ear openings of harriers are buried in the feathers of the head and can’t be seen.  The angle of the disc or ruff feathers can be adjusted to alter the focal length of the sound waves they’re collecting, which allows the bird to “focus” at different distances – a neat  trick when attempting to locate small prey in heavy vegetation.  I’ve often seen harriers dive on prey when it’s buried in brush and watched the bird cock its head back and forth as it tries to hone in on the exact location of the prey from the rustling sounds they often make.

Most hawks normally hunt by sight alone – the arsenal of harriers is double that.  This also explains why the hunting style of harriers is so distinctive from other hawks – harriers hunt very close to the ground to make their hearing more effective while other hawk species tend to hunt from higher elevations.

 

 

 1/2000, f/7.1, ISO 500, 500 f/4, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

 Finally, after almost 15 minutes of posing for me, the harrier took off.  I wasn’t able to compose this shot as I would have preferred but I like the take-off posture and the good look at the eye.

 

 

 1/3200, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

Later in the morning I spotted this male harrier (males are often called “gray ghosts”, for their color and elusiveness) hunting along the road.   For a variety of reasons it was always even with me or slightly past me when I got a shot that I liked but when I would get a slight look back from the bird I thought it made the image work pretty well.  The upper background is the Great Salt Lake with mud and sand flats at bottom.

 

 

 1/4000, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

When harriers hunt they’re nearly always looking down (watching and listening), which makes it difficult to get a good look at the eye.  But since this head position while hunting is typical for them I’ll often keep shots like that as long as the eye is distinct.  If this had been an adult female with the very dark eye I’d have trashed the shot if I didn’t have a catch light.

 

 

 1/4000, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

An image like this sometimes throws our brains for a loop.  We’re used to seeing blue sky backgrounds up top, a horizon line, then darker elements at bottom, but here those visual cues are reversed because there’s shallow water pools on the mud flats.  In this shot the blue below is water, not sky and the darker background above is mud flats.

 

 

 1/4000, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, natural light, not baited, set up or called in

Even when the bird is this far in front of my position I’ll often still like the shot if it turns its head this much to look back at me.  I do wish the right wing were lifted a bit more though.

Yep, yesterday was a harrier kind of day.  As Mia and I often say to each other, “you just never know what we’ll see on the island”.   Not that seeing harriers out there is at all unusual – but getting close to them this time of year certainly is.

Ron