Bald Eagle vs GB Heron

Fantastic action Nate. I can damned near hear the wing beats. Great emotion!

Terrific action! Are these territorial disputes? or food-related? If territorial, who backs off? I understand your disappointment, but you still captured a remarkable encounter.

Great interaction going on here. I'm jealous that you are getting to see this. Maybe next time. Can't wait to see what you get out of the 4th weekend. Good luck to you.

Thanks for your comments Charlie, David and Angela.

David, thanks I should have explained what was going on here. This is food related. The eagles and herons are competing for the same food source, sculpin fish, which are abundant in the shallow water at this location. The eagles will swoop into an area that the herons are fishing in and try to get grab the fish that the herons are hunting, sometimes they will try to grab one that the heron has already caught. Usually the herons will fly off squawking when this happens but sometimes as in this case they stand their ground. In this particular case the heron had just recently eaten a fish and I think the eagle was flying in to see if the heron might catch another.

I'm guessing the 20% you cropped off wasn't from the upper edge Nate, am I right or am I right? ...... Just playin' witcha' buddy - LOL ;^)

Seriously, although I've never tried this myself yet, and the idea might be completely against your photographic principles, I have seen a similar situation with a wonderful shot of a raptor where the tip of one wing was clipped and the photographer added canvas and did an amazing job of recreating it again. A shot like this, IMO, would be well worth the time and effort.

With or without it though, it's still an amazing capture of a candid moment, and I'd love to have caught it myself, very well done my friend :^)

BTW, the additional background info on the setting and scene is interesting and much appreciated, thanks,

If at first you don't succeed, try, try, again
Love the interaction/behavior Nate, thanx for posting this one

A terrific action you captured here, Nate. Very interesting explanation too. I love the behavioural shots so thanks for sharing.

Better even than the previous one, Nate! For me, the clipped wing is nitpicking & easily fixed in PS (wink, wink). the stances of the birds is just brilliant.

Even with the clipped wing, I like this one better than the first one too. It is a much more expressive photo. Sweet One Nate See Ya in week or so.

Ken Archer

Thanks for your comments everyone!

I know with some work I could clone in some canvas and a wing tip but although it might look nice it wouldn't qualify for the photo contests I enter then and I'd rather spend my spare time out there trying to get the shot right in the field considering this happens out there on a regular basis than working on the file in photoshop.

I guess this is the side view I mentioned in the other picture of these two (I'm assuming the same birds). Such an awesome capture!

Thanks Mark, it's the same species but different individual birds than the other shot you commented on. These types of interactions are fairly common at that location.