The moon rose in mid-afternoon on Fridat at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge and it looked like this Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) was howling at the moon. In reality, I think it might have been calling out to its mate.
As you can probably notice, I was shooting almost straight up when I took this shot. I had spotted the eagle from a distance through the branches of a tree and was able to creep relatively close to it before I had to move to an exposed position. I don’t think that the eagle had seen me yet when I took this shot, so I probably was not the cause of the eagle crying out.
The image is a bit more cluttered with branches than I would have preferred, but I really like the pose that I was able to capture, particularly the details of the beak and the eye.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 