Close view of Birds of Prey
This weekend I am in Clare in the mid-north of South Australia. My daughter teaches in the local high school and my wife is currently doing ten days of teaching there too.
Today we were invited to visit family in Jamestown, about 40 minutes north. We drove there in time for lunch and had a very pleasant afternoon sitting in the lovely sunshine. This was a complete contrast to some of the windy, cold and showery weather of recent weeks.
On our way back to Clare we had the delight of seeing two magnificent Wedge-tail Eagles gliding slowly across the road some thirty metres in front of the car. They were barely two metres off the ground. Several very frightened ducks (species unknown) were flying away at a great rate from the swampy ground near the roadside. I guess they figured that they might easily have been the eagles’ supper. The camera was in the back of the car, but they would have been well out of view before I’d stopped and switched it on.
On the journey up to Jamestown I saw plenty of Nankeen Kestrels soaring near or over the road as we drove along. I did not count them but there must have been about a dozen during the 70km trip.
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They certainly are magnificent! While at Mt Field National Park last week, right in the main picnic grounds near the office, a Wedge-tailed Eagle flew overhead at about 6 or 7 metres of the ground. It was being mobbed by 2 Ravens. The eagle did a complete roll over thrusting it’s talons out at the Ravens. Of course the whole thing happened so suddenly and was over so quickly that I just stood there, camera in hand and mouth hanging open.
WOW.
I love those amazing moments – and get equally gob smacked like you obviously were. I’m not surprised you didn’t have the composure to aim the camera.
Some years ago my wife had the camera in hand all ready to shoot when we saw our first Southern Brown Bandicoot in the wild – she was so amazed at it scampering around just a metre from our feet that she forgot to take a shot. Same thing happened years ago in Royal National Park with a Lyrebird.
Fortunately both incidents are burned into our memories. (I’ve since taken photos of both species).