GHO, Snowy's, falcon (20140130) A run with the "uncle"

It had been some time since I had the bride's uncle out for a cruise and a "chin wag". It was a last minute decision to take him for Owls as I thought he could buy me lunch at the "Rail Car". So we headed out from his place at 7:30 a.m. Forty minutes in we started finding birds like this early morning Merlin.

It was a windy day and everything was jumpy. This bird just "jumped" a couple more fence posts and allowed me a couple of shots. I think it was our fourth Snowy of the morning. The first couple didn't really give me any shots.

By 9:00 we had our 6th bird, and this little sweetheart just let us drive right up. She sat as we took our shots and we left her right where we found her, a terrific encounter.

This next bird was very hard to track with the camera, he just disappeared in the snow. I think you can see that the sky was just brutal from a light perspective.

We popped another bird off a fence line at about 200 yards, it landed on this piece of equipment. It was a long way off, but I always like to capture these birds where ever they land:)

Our next treat was this rather dark Great Horned Owl, it was in a farm yard where we have found other GHO's. It was all fluffed up and huddled down behind a building.

We swung by the restaurant and was disappointed to find the road wasn't open although some one was plowing the driveway. So we swung back for home and picked up this falcon.  I believe it is another  Gyrfalcon due to its size. You cannot tell as this shot was taken at quite a distance.

When we got back to the GHO spot it had moved to this post.

We found several of our morning Snowy's on the return run but nothing was sitting still for photo's. I was home by 12:30, with another successful trip under the belt.
Hope you have a great wildlife weekend where ever you are!
Turbo