Mariah's Day in the Sun

Mariah was the star of the show today. She kept us running during the lunch hour, but our efforts were rewarded with some terrific viewing and opportunities for many pictures. Unfortunately I missed some of the best pictures, because I had decided to try my new digiscoping setup, and my camera was attached to the scope. More on that later.

Mariah was on one of the support arms of the Main camera when I got outside. I met up with Carol P and we walked to the far corner of the Kodak visitor lot. There, we met up with Larry and Joe. Greg S showed up a few minutes later, carrying his Canon Digital Rebel camera equipped with a Canon 100-400mm image stabilized zoom lens. This is an excellent combination for taking pictures of fast-moving peregrines, which my DX6490 regrettably can't match. I continue to hope that Kodak will apply some of its technology to a "prosumer" model digicam along the lines of the Canon, Nikon D12, or Olympus eVolt, all of which seem to be very well suited to the type of photography that I often engage in...

But enough of that. No sooner had I verified her ID in my scope than she was off the tower, flying south. The buildings of the High Falls district blocked our view of her quite often because she was flying fairly low. Many of the shots I took of her were the result of snap shooting, which doesn't always produce the best results. Here's one of her just before she passed behind the Bru building:


And another when she emerged from near the BeeBee station:


We thought she was just enjoying the warm sunny weather, since her soaring didn't appear to have much of a purpose other than to circle through the sky:


At one point she landed on the Main camera housing:


It was only a few seconds before she took off again. This time, she headed south with a will. Soon we found out why. As Lisa McKeown and Cathy Steeb joined us, Kaver arrived with a lot of kacking and Mariah gave chase, intent on taking the prey that he had clutched in his talons. As they appeared and disappeared amid the buildings, I managed to get this (rather blurry) shot of the chase, just as Kaver dropped the prey:

Mariah went talons up to grab the prey according to Carol, who captured the moment with her camera. Greg too, got some fine shots of the food transfer, but from my vantage I was unable to see what happened. Hearing was another matter, though. The kacking continued as Mariah and Kaver flew over the gorge, Kaver apparently displeased that he had to relinquish his catch. Mariah wasn't to be denied, though, and Kaver gave up his pursuit. Mariah flew around with the food for a while. She was nearly in the sun here, which accounts for the backlight in this shot:

Here the prey, a black and white bird, is tucked beneath her tail:



After her flight she returned to the nest box area. Kaver had gotten there ahead of her, landing above the nest box level on the narrow steeple ledge. He greeted her arrival with more kacking. After a few minutes, it seemed both falcons were going to stay put, so I set up my scope again, and attached a lens adapter I'd recently purchased. The Kowa TSN-VA1 is designed specifically for use with long zoom digital and video cameras. It's basically a long eye-relief (57mm!) lens that gives my Kowa TSN-664 scope an 8x magnification. When combined with the 10x zoom on my DX6490, I have an 80x scope. In 35mm equivalent, that comes to a staggering 3040mm focal length!

Needless to say, that's a lot of magnification. It comes at a cost, though. Any small vibration will cause the picture to blur, and the use of a remote shutter release (not available on the DX5490) or self timer (yep, got one of those) is pretty much a requirement. Accurate focusing of the scope is also important, and as you'll see, I wasn't quite up to the task on this outing. I'm taking it as a learning experience, and I expect that as I gain more experience with the scope/camera combination my results will improve. I did get a few pictures worth sharing, though. Here's Mariah on the Main camera housing:


Kaver's sitting above her on the ledge of the steeple:


Interestingly enough, I took both of these shots using the camera's burst mode, which requires me to manually actuate the shutter. I suspect if I'd been more precise focusing the scope, the pictures would have been clearer. As I recall, these were shot with a 1/125 sec. shutter speed at f3.7. My final picture is of Mariah on top of the nest box after she fed the eyases. For this one I used the camera's self timer:


That shot is a bit clearer, but still not satisfactory. Focusing the scope using the camera's EVF or LCD screen is tricky, particularly in the bright light. I'm going to have to work on that. I did some testing on still subjects out of the wind, and I'm sure the scope/camera combination is capable of greater sharpness and clarity than these pictures demonstrate. I just need to learn how to use the equipment better, so I can achieve those results under actual viewing conditions. Time, and practice, will allow me to improve.

---

I'd like to finish with a picture I took a few days ago. It's completely unrelated to the falcon watch above, but I liked the composition and the subject, so I'm including it here for you to take as you will: