In regards to Harrier eye color and plumages, I was asked about juveniles, so I thought I'd put up some pics to show the differences. First of all, it has been proposed or talked about for years that juvenile males and females have a slight difference in plumage, but for the most part this is not true. The plumages overlap greatly; there might be a slight difference on average, but it is unreliable to sex juveniles based on body plumage alone. I won't even say what those differences could be, because it would be misleading more than helpful to the birding community, and too often I hear field marks perpetuated that are absolutely false (another post I should write). Here is a link to the post I am referring: 

http://jerryliguori.blogspot.com/2013/10/juvenile-harrier-color.html

Anyway, juvenile males have yellowish eyes, and juvenile females have brown eyes. Sometimes, juvenile males show a bluish-yellow eye, or even brownish-yellow. Hawk banders know this stuff. Here are some examples below that will help you identify photos of juveniles, of course, noting eye color in the field can be extremely difficult. And remember, fairly streaked juvenile males with yellow eyes can be confused for adult females, so check your photos!

  Juvenile Female

Juvenile Female

  Juvenile Male

  Juvenile Male

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Someone asked me if adult female Northern Harriers have a plumage that coincides with their eye color. In other words, do yellow-eyed adults look different than darker-eyed adults? And the short answer is no, adult females can look rufous washed underneath, buffy washed, heavily streaked, or lightly streaked, at any age of their adulthood (or with any eye color), below is a few examples ("click" on images to enlarge). 

And, it takes a few years for females to get the lemon-yellow eye that adult males have. Is it possible that a certain plumage is more common than another -- of course, but that is irrelevant to this issue. Thanks for the questions and hope I can answer them as they come…

 Light brown eye, buffy body

 Dark brown eye, buffy body

 Yellow eye, orange-buffy body

 Pale brown eye, buffy body

 Dark brown eye, buffy body

 Brown eye, buffy-orange body

 Pale brown eye, buffy body

 Pale brown eye, buffy-orange body

 Yellow eye, buffy body

 Dark yellow eye, buffy-orange body

 Pale brown eye, buffy body

Yellow eye, orangey body

 

 Yellow eye, orangey body

 Yellow eye, orangey body

I tend to put the copyright stamp on my bird images facing away from the subject. I'd like to hear if this is what others do, or what looks best in your opinion. Or, if I have a subject in the right-hand side of the frame, I may put the copyright to the left. Here is the same image with opposite facing copyrights. Not a great image but was handy. Any preference? Does it even matter?

Just thought I would post a few Ferruginous pics since someone asked ("click" on photos to enlarge). I have too many to go through thoroughly right now, so I'll post more down the road. The nest shot is from years ago when conducting surveys and research, otherwise I keep my distance from nesting birds (if anyone was curious).

I've had several people send me personal e-mails asking how I shoot raptors, particularly about what mode I shoot. Its a loaded question of course because depending on the lighting, lens, situation, what the bird is doing (and several other factors) makes a difference in how to take pictures. I'll just discuss raptors in flight for now. I always shoot manual mode so I control the aperture and shutter speed instead of letting the camera decide. This is what works for me and what I am comfortable with, but I have been photographing birds in flight since 1993, so I am comfortable how to shoot at under all conditions. To put it in perspective, I have over 20,000 Red-tailed Hawk pictures alone on my hard drive (after deleting the "throw-aways"). If you don't feel confident in doing so, DON'T. There are tons of photographers that take amazing photos, and everyone has their preference, so there is no single correct way.

Shooting in manual mode allows me to lock or unlock the aperture setting, but more important for me than that, is it allows me to change the shutter speed instantly with the turn of a dial. This is ideal for shooting moving subjects in many situations. If you choose to let the camera decide the shutter speed for birds overhead, the camera will underexpose and overexpose a number of photos. Yes, you can use exposure compensation, but that might still leads to 'misses' in exposure. Check out these photos of the same Cooper's Hawk taken seconds apart. The "sunny 16" rule normally does well (for topsides or birds at eye-level) when the sun is directly exposing a bird, but when the bird flares overhead, I like to choose the exposure. I shot the underside of this bird at f4 -- 1/800 sec. (200 ISO), and the topside at f4 -- 1/2500 sec. (200 ISO), changing the shutter speed as the bird turned. Again, this takes lots of practice, so it may not be for everybody, buts its the way I feel comfortable.

Speaking of Red-tailed Hawks…most Red-tails range between 850-1200 gms, with petite ones around 750 gms, and larger ones about 1350 gms. Check out this young Eastern Red-tail caught in November 1995 (or 1996?) at Cape May Point, NJ. It weighed 1740 gms (3.8 lbs) !!!!!!  The bird in these pictures was massive, look at that chest, back, and feet! And, it did not have any food in the crop, as that can give it a false weight. This bird is heavier than almost all of the Ferruginous and Rough-legged Hawks I have caught.

So, my question is, does anyone know of a larger Red-tail on record? I would love to hear about it, and await any responses. And if not, what is the largest Red-tail you have heard of? Thanks to Kara Donohue for holding this bird and letting me see it (I'm sure she was the one to catch it too).