Monday 11 April 2011: Harris Hawk

Zoo:#13

Large

Up, up and over to the right. That's the chronological order and, unfortunately for Harry here, the path of the meat. I've seen this display a few times now and havn't been happy with any of my pictures of Harry (I don't really know what his/her name is). Today was lucky thirteenth visit and I am rather pleased with this little sequence not least of all because it gives you an idea of this guys acrobatic abilities. I think he catches this little bit of meat, thrown by the handler, one out three tries but he gives it his all every time. He does a couple of other tricks which are most impressive and also lightening fast.

I might have got the birds out of my system for now, I'll try and be a bit more original for the next few visits but it's not the last you've seen of them, I'm sure.

The Harris Hawk is one of the most social hunting birds and is easy to train making them ideal for falconing. In the wild they are (almost?) unique amongst hunting birds in that they hunt in (family) groups. Which I thought was interesting.

• DSLR-A330:
• f/4.0:
• 1/1600":
• 85mm:
• ISO 200

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