Tag: Black-shouldered Kite
Blue Skies of a Winter August
| Black-shouldered Kite
Gowrie Junction, Queensland, Australia August, 2015 (Above and below) |
Here are some pics from a couple of outings with Kevin Williams in the second week of August. The mornings were cold but the sky was blue and incredibly clear. The days warmed up and were very comfortable. I certainly wasn’t bored with beautiful birds everywhere.
These pics were with the Nikon D7100 and Nikkor AF-S 80-400mm VR. I think they are nice and clear but I was having trouble framing them with a smaller viewfinder than the D800 and I kept chopping off the bird’s wings when they flew… It was the first real run I’ve had with the camera since I got it. On other days I felt birds in Australia were too far away with the full-framed D800…
Getting back to the birds….aren’t Black-shouldered Kites just superb up against the blue?
Thanks for the outings, Kevin!
| Australian Kestrel also known as Nankeen Kestrel
Oakey, Queensland, Australia |
| Black-shouldered Kite
Gowrie Junction, Queensland, Australia and below.. |
| Black Falcon
Toowoomba tip, Queensland, Australia and below… |
| Black Kite
Toowoomba tip, Queensland, Australia and below.. |
| Galah
Toowoomba tip, Queensland, Australia |
Guardians of Westgate Park
Brown Falcon
launching from a stone sculpture with the
Westgate Bridge in the background.
Westgate Park, Port Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
1990s
Here are some photos from the Kodak Photo CD made on May 13, 1999. All these shots were at Westgate Park, Port Melbourne in the 1990s. I don’t know why I wanted these scanned. I think they had landmarks. I often visited the park in the 1990s as it was the best place to find raptors near the Melbourne CBD.
I have many nice memories and loads of negatives and slides. Nothing worth hanging on the wall but I think I have some nice historical records for the end of the century.
Apart from these pictures I also remember photographing a Spotted Harrier having a dogfight with a Whistling Kite in the middle of a 45C day. Who in their right mind would be out birding then?
I also had a close encounter with a young Black Falcon cutting through the park (winter). Well out of its recorded area but I’d been photographing them a week earlier in Queensland and felt they were following me around.
I watched a Nankeen Kestrel grab an Indian Myna in flight and the two cart-wheeled to the ground. I got two shots of it. It would be nice to find them. The birds disappeared behind a hedge in a business property next to the park so I couldn’t go in. Neither bird appeared again, leaving me to imagine the outcome.
Other raptors included, Australian Hobby (regular), Brown Goshawk – I watched being chased away by a team of Black-shouldered Kite and Peregrine Falcon (on one occasion), Collared Sparrowhawk, and Swamp Harrier.
Pretty cool for a major urban environment!
Little Eagle
Fox
and
Australian White Ibis
OnLine
| Black-shouldered Kite
Southbrook, Queensland, Australia March 2013 |
A couple of Black-shouldered Kites sitting on electrical lines in the Southbrook to Felton area. They’re lovely little graceful raptors and it’s a healthy sign to have them around. Notice their short, fat toes for dropping belly first into long grass after rats and mice. I have seen them go for birds such as starlings as well.
| Black-shouldered Kite
Felton, Queensland, Australia. |
