Snapshots: Hangin’ out the Sheets with Eloise

This gracious lady is currently settled in to the K Road Cliffs area at Werribee. There is a horseshoe bend in the river and it obviously suits her fishing style. Not being a fishing sort of person, I don’t understand how the fish run up the estuary but suspect now, that it is more likely on the turn of the tide as the water flow out. Today that would have happend around sunup, and most likely she had hunted on the early morning light.
By the time we, and 10 or so of our new close personal friends, rocked up after breakfast, she was well fed and/or the fish had gone as she showed little inclination for hunting.

However she did manage to make the photographers smile. On a tree close to the river edge, and in full sunlight.

So given an appreciative audience, she ran through the entire preening process, making sure every feather had a lick, and was back in the right place. By 10:30 am, it was all over she packed up the sheets, took a long stretch and headed up river for her own reasons.

I thought I’d post a small selection, as I can quickly see that I am going to end up with days of work that don’t get sorted nor published.

So prepare for a few more blogs as the days progress.

Enjoy.

One of my favourite activites with raptors is that ‘zipping’ up of the tail feathers.

After stiting in the hot sun for several hours she was panting and drooping out her wings

She is folding up the sheets, and I rather like the look of the power and depth of the wings shown here.

Time to turn around. A delicate process and a test of balance and wing work

A final big stretch of wings, tail, body and legs. It must be time to go

Feathers, feet and tail hard at work to regain equilibrium

7 thoughts on “Snapshots: Hangin’ out the Sheets with Eloise”

Eleanor Dilley says:

January 30, 2019 at 5:01 am

Wow, David! A wonderful series of shots that lets us into her world.

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1. David Jenkins says:
  
  January 30, 2019 at 6:08 am
  
  Thanks Eleanor, we are pretty lucky to be only 15mins away so can sort of pick our time and light. But, of course the tricky bit is waiting for her to indulge us by fishing.
  
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derekmidgley says:

January 30, 2019 at 5:12 am

Wow, what an awesome set of Eloise moments so beautifully captured. She really does seem so relaxed!

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1. David Jenkins says:
  
  January 30, 2019 at 6:10 am
  
  Hi Derek, she is on a tree on the far side of the river so it not threatened. She did cross over for a short time, but I think the thronging crowd proved too much or the view wasn’t suitable, and she crossed back to the island area.
  We really could not have asked for better light.
  
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David Nice says:

January 30, 2019 at 6:07 am

Such great beauty so wonderfully captured, David. It is so great to see her back.
I must make some time to visit her again.

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1. David Jenkins says:
  
  January 30, 2019 at 6:11 am
  
  Thanks David. Lucked out more than anything. I think the water is starting to bloom up, so hope we get a bit of rain to flush it through. Further upstream, it is quite the pea soup.
  
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Anonymous says:

January 30, 2019 at 11:59 am

Gorgeous series David 😊

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