{"id":1749,"date":"2011-01-03T09:18:01","date_gmt":"2011-01-03T15:18:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/?p=1749"},"modified":"2026-04-28T07:24:03","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T12:24:03","slug":"if-only","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2011\/01\/03\/if-only\/","title":{"rendered":"If Only…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"MaleAmerican Kestrel male with prey – Nikon D200, f6.3, 1\/1500, ISO 400, +0.3 EV, Nikkor 200-400mm VR with 1.4x TC at 400mm, natural light, not baited, not a set up<\/span><\/p>\n

If only<\/em>… this American Kestrel (Falco sparverius)<\/em> had turned more my way when it lifted off with its prey.<\/p>\n

If only<\/em>… I would have had more shutter speed to freeze the wing action.<\/p>\n

If only<\/em>… I would have been closer or had more focal length so this would not be a large crop.<\/p>\n

Those are just some of the frustrations that bird photographers go through.<\/p>\n

But with each “bad image” I create I review and see what I might have been able to change to get a better shot and the next time I am presented with a similar situation I can recall those thoughts and quickly change my settings, angle or location.<\/p>\n

Taking the time to review my “bad images” strengthens me as a photographer.<\/p>\n

Live and learn!<\/p>\n

Life is<\/em> good.<\/p>\n

Mia<\/p>\n

Click here<\/span><\/a> to see more of my American Kestrel photos plus facts and information about this species.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Taking the time to review my “bad images” strengthens me as a photographer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":164294,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[152,27,697,26],"tags":[155,2663,4199,4279,4052,4122,1023,4062,4094,4106,153,4050,4328,4095,373],"class_list":["post-1749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-american-kestrel","category-avian","category-farmington-bay-wma","category-utah","tag-american-kestrel","tag-birds-of-prey","tag-falco-sparverius","tag-falcons","tag-flight","tag-flying","tag-frustrations-in-bird-photography1","tag-male","tag-marsh","tag-prey","tag-raptors","tag-snow","tag-snowy","tag-wetlands","tag-winter"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-prey-mia-mcpherson-0450.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p11Mom-sd","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":14652,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2014\/03\/30\/female-american-kestrel-with-prey\/","url_meta":{"origin":1749,"position":0},"title":"Female American Kestrel With Prey","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"March 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"American Kestrels are fascinating falcons, they are tiny, colorful and at times quite pugnacious.","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Female American Kestrel with prey in Utah, Farmington Bay WMA, Davis County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-female-prey-mia-mcpherson-5625.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-female-prey-mia-mcpherson-5625.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-female-prey-mia-mcpherson-5625.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8507,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2013\/06\/02\/hovering-american-kestrel\/","url_meta":{"origin":1749,"position":1},"title":"Hovering American Kestrel Male In Utah","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"June 2, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Hovering Kestrel shots aren't easy to capture without baiting or using decoys, part of that is because I can't tell when a kestrel might get it in its mind to hover for prey, the other part is being in the right place at the right time.","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Hovering American Kestrel male, Antelope Island State Park, Davis County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-hovering-mia-mcpherson-3637.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-hovering-mia-mcpherson-3637.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-hovering-mia-mcpherson-3637.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-hovering-mia-mcpherson-3637.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7839,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2013\/03\/12\/side-lit-american-kestrel\/","url_meta":{"origin":1749,"position":2},"title":"Side Lit American Kestrel","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"March 12, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"I came across this American Kestrel image yesterday while moving images to a new external hard drive and realized I hadn't edited any of the photos in the series yet, so I did.","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Side lit American Kestrel male at Farmington Bay WMA, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-mia-mcpherson-8074.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-mia-mcpherson-8074.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-mia-mcpherson-8074.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":18140,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2014\/12\/23\/female-kestrel-with-prey-on-a-snowy-day\/","url_meta":{"origin":1749,"position":3},"title":"Female Kestrel With Prey On A Snowy Day","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"December 23, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I've been seeing plenty of American Kestrels lately but none have been close enough to get nice images of so I pulled this one out of my archives from 2010.","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Female Kestrel with prey on a snowy day, Farmington Bay WMA, Davis County, 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2012","format":false,"excerpt":"There is something about American Kestrels that speaks to me. They might be our smallest falcon in North America but they have big attitudes, fierce characters and are terrific hunters.","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Male American Kestrel lifting off from a post, Antelope Island State Park, Davis County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-lift-off-mia-mcpherson-7976.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-lift-off-mia-mcpherson-7976.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-lift-off-mia-mcpherson-7976.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-male-lift-off-mia-mcpherson-7976.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2197,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2011\/04\/14\/argh-dont-turn\/","url_meta":{"origin":1749,"position":5},"title":"Argh.. Don’t Turn!! – Male American Kestrel In Flight With A Vole","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"April 14, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Male American Kestrel in flight with a vole chased off by an appraoching vehicle","rel":"","context":"In "American Kestrels"","block_context":{"text":"American Kestrels","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/falcons\/american-kestrel\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Male American Kestrel in flight with a vole, Antelope Island State Park, Davis County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-flight-vole-mia-mcpherson-7280.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-flight-vole-mia-mcpherson-7280.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-flight-vole-mia-mcpherson-7280.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/american-kestrel-flight-vole-mia-mcpherson-7280.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1749"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":175575,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1749\/revisions\/175575"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/164294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}