More Mariah and Digiscoping

Another day of sun and warm temperatures tempted me outside at lunchtime today despite a schedule filled with meetings. Equipped with my scope, camera, and binoculars, I found Shaky across the street from the Kodak Visitor parking lot, where he was keeping an eye on Mariah. I had just set up my scope and after yesterday's missed opportunities, I was debating whether to connect the camera for some digiscoping when Mariah made the decision for me. She threw herself in the air and treated us to some overhead flying. Much of it was right in the bright sun, but between her solar-crossing forays I was able to get a few pictures:



Greg S arrived and we had 3 cameras clicking while Mariah continued her circling flight. As with yesterday, she flew toward downtown and our view was often obscured by the area buildings, but a few minutes later she returned to the tower, accompanied by Kaver:


Mariah landed on the east railing of the playpen while Kaver headed out over the river. By this time, Lisa McKeown, Sue, Grannywood and Carol P had arrived. Mariah looked content enough on the rail, so I switched to digiscoping mode. My results were slightly better this time around, but I think I still have some work to do. Here's a shot of Mariah on the railing:


I was able to shoot quite a number of pictures of her, using both burst mode and the camera's self timer. Between the wind, passing truck traffic, and the poor balance of the camera/scope combination, I'm still getting blurry pictures even after careful focusing. After a few minutes of inactivity, she took off again. It was pure seredipity that I was able to get this shot, since I used the self timer for it:


She flew around a bit, but decided to land again, this time on the Main camera's mounting arm:



It was about that time that I noticed Kaver had landed on the steeple above the nestbox. Back to digiscoping I went to capture shots of both falcons on their perches:



I think this is my best digiscoped shot of the day:


I'll keep working on the clarity of the digiscoped shots. I think I could get more steadiness out of the camera/scope combination if I could balance it better on the tripod. Kowa sells a mounting system that accomplishes that very thing, but it's an expensive piece of equipment, so I think I'll try a little more practice before I shell out more money...