Great Grey Pictures part I

I have rather a lot of Great Grey Owl pictures that I want to show. When I spend time with this fantastic species my hope is always to capture it hunting. This is easier said than done though. A lot of time is spent watching the bird sleeping during the day when it does very little other than preening or yawning. When it is hunting then it can perch on a tree stump or branch for 10 minutes before all the action happens in the course of a few seconds. You miss it if you do not have your finger ready on the shutter button and even if you are ready you have to hope that the bird doesn’t fly behind a bush or that the camera loses focus. I am still waiting for that perfect shot but have never-the-less accumulated a huge library of other shots that aren’t too bad.

I will start with some close ups.

starting to preen

stretching

important to loo after those feathers

post preen silly face

what a tongue! Look also at the half closed inner eyelids

the hole in the top of the mouth is presumably from the nostrils

here the bird has a posture that makes it look far slimmer and has me thinking of Long-eared Owl