I haven’t posted much over the past few days because we had a humdinger of a winter storm here in the Northland. Yesterday when the sun finally came out I was marooned at our house. 60+ mph wind gusts brought down some pine trees which blocked my only exit from my small neighborhood. Just as well because I needed to shovel all the snow off the sidewalk and driveway.

However, this morning I escaped and arrived at Sax-Zim Bog a half hour before dawn. Perhaps that was not a great idea. The mercury was -18F. While the winds had finally abated the severely cold temperature is never great for birding.

On the way home I did find a very cooperative Rough Legged Hawk. See the very final image which will show you how you may know when a raptor is about to take off … within seconds! Cheers.

Look towards the bottom center of this image!!! At this point you would want to press the shutter down, and keep it down (continuous mode)