Just realized that I haven’t posted to this blog since January 29. But I guess I could be forgiven as Ann and I have been busy. It started on Friday, January 23, a little over two weeks ago. I was working in my office at the computer when I little wet spot on the carpet caught my eye. Thinking that our little Shi-tzu, Susie, had an accident, we started soaking up water. However, after using up an entire roll of paper towels, we decided that was a little too much water for a little 13 lb. dog.
We called a plumber who came promptly and diagnosed the problem as a leak in the hot water line above the slab. He turned off the water, and except for turning it back on for short few minute intervals, we were basically out of water until the following Tuesday morning.
Then the repairs were made then. I won’t go into details how they did the repairs, will say that several holes were cut in our walls to locate the problem piping. As I write, repairmen are here repairing the holes in the dry wall.
During the past several days while all of this was going on, we didn’t get out much. Besides it has been pretty dang cold on some of those days.
However, on one of our short forays we were at Middle Concho Park. As we approached one area near a small inlet from the river, we spotted a Red-tailed Hawk on the ground. He was trying to snack on an American Coot that he apparently had captured moments before. I approached him carefully with our car, keeping some trees between us. I was able to get in position for this photo, from about 150 feet away.
Red-tailed Hawk with deceased prey.
We watched him for a few minutes. He eventually sensed that he was being watched and he took flight. He headed for another tree nearby, but on the way he dropped the Coot. He decided to stay on the tree limb for awhile.
Red-tailed Hawk
He was somewhat shaded in this photo, but I guess that he decided to help me out, and moved to a better open position on another limb so I could get a better shot. I was probably about 200 feet away at this new location.
Red-tailed Hawk
This was a much better position. We then watched him for awhile from a spot behind some trees hoping to catch him as he left the perch to retrieve his meal. It didn’t happen so we drove away and left him alone. I think we were far enough away to avoid distressing him, but I didn’t want to take chances of doing so.
These photos were taken with my Canon 7D Mark II. The lens was my older Canon 100-400mm lens with a 1.4 teleconverter attached. I discovered that it doesn’t focus as fast, with the teleconverter, as my new Tamron 150-600mm lens. That lens is on it’s way back from the factory where I had sent it for a free firmware update. It should be back “Tuesday before 8:00PM” says the tracking. That really means that it will be delivered at 8:00PM. 🙂
Texas Tweeties by Bob Zeller 