One man's two owls - EOS 1D mk II first results

Bernd Heinrich's "One Man's Owl" tells the story of his rescuing Bubo, a great horned owl, and how Bubo learned to hunt red squirrels, resist mobbing crows and find shelter in Maine's northern forests. I've been watching a great horned owl in Sycamore Grove, a rural park in nearby Livermore, California.

I got my first chance to try out a new Canon EOS 1D mk II with the owl last night. I made the short hike to the view of the utility pole 'my' owl likes to perch on. He wasn't there yet so I allowed the broken-accordion cries of several red-capped acorn woodpeckers to distract me. I heard their slow drumming as they looked for a late snack in a nearby dead tree. I happened to look over at a fallen log on the grass-browned ridge to my left. This log had two funny-looking knobs sticking up at either end. A look through the 1000mm f/8 on the camera confirmed not one but two great horned owls who seemed to play teeter-totter on the log:
http://www.mountain-and-desert.com/Wildlife/Birds/Owls_BO/DBO-GO0054-5.htm

The two kept looking over their shoulders at something outside the lens' field of view. I looked up and saw mule deer grazing the brown grass on the hillside. The pickings must have been good near the owls since one of the deer browsed towards them:
http://www.mountain-and-desert.com/Wildlife/Birds/Owls_BO/DBO-GO0059-5.htm

But the best-lit shot of the evening was this acorn woodpecker looking like his contact lens was crooked:
http://www.mountain-and-desert.com/Wildlife/Birds/Tree-Clinging_BT/DBT-ZW0036-5.htm

I saw two more owls fly towards a distant leafless tree, so there were four of them out there. I'll be going back for more...

All comments welcome.

Mark Bohrer
www.mountain-and-desert.com
Adventure travel and wildlife photography 


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