Spent last Friday at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo photographing the denizens. So this week is Animal Week here at the blog, with lots of animal portraits, fun animal facts, and thoughts about animal characters in comics. (For photo geeks, all images were taken with the faithful Pentax K-5iis and the 55-300mm zoom, which we call the Zoo Lens for a reason. Further details on request.
We begin as the day began, which was with threatening rain that started pour just as we arrived at the Wolf Lodge observation area. While other zoo goers hung around the lodge and played solitaire on their phones and fed raisins to their kids, I found this bald eagle perched in the rain among some willow trees, in an enclosure where I could photograph him from a dry place indoors. (Look closely at the second image to see an interesting view of this hunter’s powerful eye.)
It doesn’t surprise me that the water beaded up on his feathers, keeping him dry, and that he didn’t seem troubled by the rain. These are fishing eagles and spend a lot of their time in wet places. Like most eagles (most birds, really), he persistently kept his back to the camera.