Description

We finally got a break from winter for a couple days and I decided to head to an area in Spencer County KY near Taylorsville Lake State Park just to kind of get out and about. This area is usually a great place to photograph deer and other critters but on this day there were a great many small birds in addition to a few deer that I was photographing. I heard a noise to my left and was surprised to see this beautiful Red-shouldered Hawk at basically point blank range putting the ole ‘hawk eye’ on me. I am always amazed at how quite raptors are even when landing or taking off. Even more remarkable was that he stayed with me for about 5 minutes before I resumed my outing. It must have been a great hunting area for the hawk because he was still there when I left! As a note, the clear blue sky in the background really helped accentuated the hawk’s colors in this shot. A fortuitous bonus shot for me in addition to the deer this day.

Category

Predatory birds

Species

• Red-shouldered Hawk