This year is predicted to bring the best winter finch irruption since 1997 to upstate New York and other areas of the northeast. What this means is that birds that normally stay farther north, such as Common and Hoary Redpolls and Pine Grosbeaks, are migrating farther south in large numbers this winter. Chris and I have high hopes of photographing these species during the few weeks we will spend at his grandparents’ this winter.

Yesterday, we made a trip to our friend Eric’s house to photograph Evening Grosbeaks, a species that normally occurs farther north but isn’t too uncommon in some areas of the state this time of year. Eric’s feeders always get a great assortment of birds and he seems to get many of the rarieties that pop into the area from time to time. Chris and I set up two pop-up blinds near one feeder and spent much of the morning photographing Black-capped Chickadees and the occassional White-breasted Nuthatch and Hairy Woodpecker that visited. Finally, a few female Evening Grosbeaks made an appearance, followed by even more females and several males. Chris and I happily fired away as the birds landed on the perch Eric had set up nearby.

We had each managed a few dozen shots of the grosbeaks when they suddenly flushed without warning. Then a beautiful black and gray bird appeared on our perch and we immediately knew why - a Northern Shrike had flown in. Shrikes are predatory birds that feed on insects, small reptiles, small mammals, and other birds, usually impaling them on a sharp branch, fence post, or barbed wire after killing them in order to feed. There are two species of Shrike that occur in the United States, the southern Loggerhead Shrike and the harder to photograph Northern Shrike. Because Shrikes are solitary predators and rather small in size (about the size of American Robin) they can be very difficult to find and don’t visit feeders like chickadees or finches do. The most impressive shrike photos I have ever seen are of Loggerhead Shrikes found feeding on lizards in the southwestern deserts, where shrikes can be found by searching for areas where dead lizards and rodents from previous shrike kills hang from barbed wire. In the heavily forested territory of the Northern Shrike however, photographers don’t have the luxury of wide open desert to provide clutter free backgrounds and vast stretches of land where the only objects suitable for impaling small creatures on are few and far in between, so photographing a bird such as the difficult to find Northern Shrike - on a natural perch set up with a clean background no less - is quite a rare opportunity.

I managed to squeeze off two frames - one of which was deleted immediately due to motion blur - before the bird took off. Had I not been so numb from the cold and had my camera not refocused as the shrike sat there, I may have captured a few more, but sometimes one shot is all you need. In this case, the bird is sharp and well exposed, and the composition is acceptable, so I’m pretty happy with the end result.

Techs: Canon 1D Mark II N, 300mm f/2.8L IS, 1.4x Mark II Extender, 1/250s, f/7.1, ISO 800.  To order this print, purchase stock rights, or view other photos I have for sale, please visit my website at www.karipost.com.