Jane's Eagle by Phil Winterbourne

Phil Winterbourne | all galleries >> Travel - World >> Soldeu 2007 > Jane's Eagle


27-FEB-2007

Jane's Eagle

This was one of a pair of Eagles (?) we saw soaring high above Canillo. The image is a tiny crop from my original picture - with only a 135mm zoom they were just dots. It would be great if someone could give me an identification of the species.

Canon EOS 5D
1/200s f/7.1 at 135.0mm iso100 full exif

other sizes: small medium large auto

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Jan Charteris		14-Oct-2007 20:14
Its a Griffon Vulture:) sorry for late post but Ive just come across this page on a google search.. cheers Jan

Phil Winterbourne		06-Mar-2007 16:19
Rob - I have about another 150 to sort through. Not all will make it here though. I recon a week or so should see me done. Phil

Rob Johnson		06-Mar-2007 15:13
Hi Phil, Good photos. Any more? I don't know about this bird. It's not a Golden Eagle as they are much darker, I think a Bonelli Eagle is a lot lighter and I am swayed toward the Bald Eagle but they are native of USA surely !!!! I hope someone works it out soon 'cos I'm goin' crazy :-@ Rob (Soldeu 2007 Team)

Gerry Winterbourne		05-Mar-2007 13:05
Much the most likely identification is Bonelli's eagle, a "scarce resident of rocky, open country". It is rare, with only about 1,000 pairs in Europe but about half of them are in Spain. Its length is given as 25 - 28 inches, which would give this one a wingspan of approaching 6 feet. It actually looks more like the illustration of a Booted eagle in our book, but that is a migrant and should only be in Spain in the summer. It is smaller than Bonelli's, wingspan perhaps 4 - 5 feet. Apparently both types of eagle are commonly confused with the Common buzzard. However, the buzzard is dark at the front of its wigs and pale at the back, so this specimen is clearly not a buzzard. What you need, of course, is a cheap 2X or 3X extender.