Sunday Birding

[dejong]

The prospect of seeing lots of Short-eared owls (after Charley) lured Greg Swick and I to Lockwood.  Here are pictures of a few birds we saw.  The first two are of a Merlin.  The next is of a curious Red-tailed Hawk that seemed little afraid of us, even after we got out of the truck.  Then there were the thousands of Snow Geese that seemed to just fly in huge circles around a corn field.    The Great-horned Owl sits in his silo at Bois D Arc, but we are too far away and it is too dark to get a really good shot.  We saw smaller birds too, as the White-crowned Sparrow illustrates. 

[Charley Burwick]

Great spotting of the Merlin.  I have been trying to find a Merlin over near Lockwood all winter with no luck. 

[Lisa Berger]

I especially like the action image of the Merlin taking off. Raptors are awesome. Nice shots Marv.

[dejong]

Thanks, Greg spots and ID's the birds and, with luck, I get a picture.  In this case, I was driving and holding the camera while Greg was steering.  When we got too close for the Merlin's comfort, he took off.  I was taking pictures all the time because you never know when they get nervous and fly.