{"id":76205,"date":"2020-12-16T05:44:19","date_gmt":"2020-12-16T12:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/?p=76205"},"modified":"2024-07-19T02:11:24","modified_gmt":"2024-07-19T07:11:24","slug":"first-winter-ferruginous-hawk-in-the-west-desert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2020\/12\/16\/first-winter-ferruginous-hawk-in-the-west-desert\/","title":{"rendered":"First Winter Ferruginous Hawk In The West Desert"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"FirstFirst winter light morph Ferruginous Hawk on a rocky hill \u2013 Nikon D500, f10, 1\/4000, ISO 800, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light, not baited<\/span><\/p>\n

Two years and one day ago I only photographed two birds on a trip out into the West Desert and this light morph Ferruginous Hawk made the trip well worth the journey out into the cold.<\/p>\n

When I first spotted and pointed out this young hawk it was perched on top of a hill with the snow covered Stansbury Mountains in the background.<\/p>\n

The young hawk was quite sticky and at first I thought it was because it was extremely cold that morning but in a few minutes I knew the reason why this large raptor was sticky, it was because it was getting ready to expel a pellet. I watched through my viewfinder as the expelled pellet rolled down the hill into a patch of snow.<\/p>\n

\"FirstFirst winter Ferruginous Hawk in front of snowy mountains \u2013 Nikon D500, f7.1, 1\/8000, ISO 800, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light, not baited<\/span><\/p>\n

After expelling the pellet of undigested fur and bones the immature Ferruginous Hawk took off and flew a short distance to the top of another hill where it landed and perched for several minutes. At times I felt like the large, young raptor was giving me the stink eye but I believe it was searching for prey in the field east of the road because when it lifted off…<\/p>\n

\"FirstFirst winter Ferruginous Hawk with its wings spread wide \u2013 Nikon D500, f7.1, 1\/4000, ISO 800, +0.3 EV, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light, not baited<\/span><\/p>\n

It flew directly towards me where I sat in a vehicle with my lens aimed out of the window.This image is full frame and I was barely able to get the tips of both wings into it. I hadn’t share this image before because I wasn’t sure I liked how the hawk seemed to blend into the rocks behind it but after processing it I decided that I like it, a lot.<\/p>\n

The Ferruginous Hawk flew so close to me that I couldn’t focus on it when it flew over the vehicle. I did get several out of focus images where all I could see was the tail and feet of the hawk.\u00a0 I could see out the windows that the Ferruginous Hawk aborted its attempt to capture prey and then it flew off to land on a fence post that was too far away to photograph.<\/p>\n

One good bird can make my day. This Ferruginous Hawk was that<\/em> bird.<\/p>\n

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

Mia<\/p>\n

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

Two years and one day ago I only photographed two birds on a trip out into the West Desert and this light morph Ferruginous Hawk made the trip well worth the journey out into the cold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":95459,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,1069,1316,358,26,1314],"tags":[4268,2497,4098,2092,2450,4052,4122,4033,4169,2386,5023,4067,2670,4069,4104,153,4470,4050,4328,373,4193],"class_list":["post-76205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-avian","category-ferruginous-hawks","category-stansbury-mountains-utah","category-tooele-county","category-utah","category-west-desert-utah","tag-buteo-regalis","tag-buteos","tag-desert","tag-ferruginous-hawk","tag-first-winter","tag-flight","tag-flying","tag-hawk","tag-hawks","tag-hawks-of-utah","tag-head-on","tag-immature","tag-light-morph","tag-mountains","tag-perched","tag-raptors","tag-rocks","tag-snow","tag-snowy","tag-winter","tag-young"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-rocky-hillside-mia-mcpherson-4732.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p11Mom-jP7","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":108170,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2022\/11\/21\/west-desert-dark-morph-ferruginous-hawk\/","url_meta":{"origin":76205,"position":0},"title":"West Desert Dark Morph Ferruginous Hawk","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"November 21, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Nearly three years have passed since I found, pointed out, and photographed this stunning dark morph Ferruginous Hawk in the West Desert of Utah.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Dark morph Ferruginous Hawk lifting one foot, West Desert, Tooele County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-mia-mcpherson-4399.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-mia-mcpherson-4399.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-mia-mcpherson-4399.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-mia-mcpherson-4399.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":118517,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2023\/11\/24\/dark-morph-ferruginous-hawk-in-the-west-desert\/","url_meta":{"origin":76205,"position":1},"title":"Dark Morph Ferruginous Hawk In The West Desert","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"November 24, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Four years ago today, I found this gorgeous dark morph Ferruginous Hawk perched on a juniper fence post in the West Desert. I spotted it from about a mile away.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Lifting off dark morph Ferruginous Hawk, West Desert, Tooele County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-west-desert-mia-mcpherson-4510.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-west-desert-mia-mcpherson-4510.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/ferruginous-hawk-dark-morph-west-desert-mia-mcpherson-4510.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, 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Surveying The Foothills Of The Stansbury Mountains","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"March 2, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"It's been four years since I photographed this gorgeous male Rough-legged Hawk as he surveyed the foothills of the Stansbury Mountains in Utah's West Desert.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Male Rough-legged Hawk in the West Desert of Utah, Tooele County","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/rough-legged-hawk-adult-male-fence-post-utah-mia-mcpherson-6308.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/rough-legged-hawk-adult-male-fence-post-utah-mia-mcpherson-6308.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, 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"Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Ferruginous Hawk lifting off from a hill, West Desert, Tooele County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mia-mcpherson-4946.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mia-mcpherson-4946.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mia-mcpherson-4946.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mia-mcpherson-4946.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 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The light was good, I had birds in my viewfinder and I was away from our building inversion so I was one happy woman.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Ferruginous Hawk in flight in front of snow covered mountains, West Desert, Tooele County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mountains-mia-mcpherson-4731.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mountains-mia-mcpherson-4731.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mountains-mia-mcpherson-4731.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/ferruginous-hawk-flight-mountains-mia-mcpherson-4731.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\/76205","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=76205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76205\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}