Lillian Roberts, APSA, GMPSA/B  

Western Screech Owl w Mouse by Lillian Roberts, APSA, GMPSA/B

June 2026 - Western Screech Owl w Mouse

About the Image(s)

My friend in Green Valley, AZ has a western screech owl nesting annually on his property. He watches them closely and makes sure they are used to him working near the next box. In SPring while they are feeding chicks, he sets up a 3-flash motion trigger and clients can set up both wide-angle and telephoto lens prefocused on the spot where the sensor is aimed. The cameras are set on Interval mode, so the shutter opens for 30seconds at a time until the battery dies or someone turns it off. The incoming birds trigger the flashes as they bring prey to the chicks.

It's common for "something" to go wrong during the night - a javalina knocks over a tripod, or the bird lands on a flash knocking it out of kilter. So I will set up three cameras and go for at least two nights, and still wind up with just 10 or 12 usable images. This is a favorite. The odd crop is to eliminate the actual flashes from the image, which were just in front of the bird.

Shutter speed: 30 sec
Aperture: 9
Exposure mode: Manual
Flash: Off
Metering mode: Multi-segment
ISO: 800
Lens: FE 200-600mm F5.6-6.3 G OSS
Focal length: 600mm

4 comments posted

Deborah Albert
WOW. I do wish you had more space on the bottom and to the left.   Posted: 06/13/2026 06:28:49
Richard Fisher
I understand the challenge of beam tripper, flash photography in the dark. Your camera is a Sony A II (I downloaded the picture and checked INFO, then deleted it) which is a 50MP camera. Not sure how you set up the image but you were at the maximum zoom range. If you had zoomed out to 500 mm you might have a bit more area around the bird to get a better composition.

Other than the tight composition on the bottom, I think you did a wonderful job. You were fortunately the bird was flying so you got a great portrait pose. Very well done and excellent post processing   Posted: 06/13/2026 12:06:02
Lillian Roberts   Lillian Roberts
Richard, thanks for your comments. The image is cropped quite a bit from the right, as well as the left and somewhat from above. It would have been possible (and easy) to clone out the equipment that appeared on the left side of the original image, but that is not allowed in Nature Division competition.

One reason for zooming out all the way is to allow for the camera and tripod to be set out further from the spot, to minimize the fairly steep upward angle. The second night, we actually mounted the tripods on ladders using a lot of zip ties. Luckily none were knocked down that night!

  Posted: 06/13/2026 17:09:30
Pinaki Sarkar   Pinaki Sarkar
The background is very dark - adding a subtle gradient or lifting the deepest shadows could create more dimensionality without losing the dramatic mood. A slight warm tone on the owl's face could add life and presence. The prey is clearly visible but for the owls face I am little confused. Maybe lift shadows under the wings to reveal a little more structure. Talons got cropped a bit, probably accidentally while cropping ? Why dark background ? Not sure whether the background is artificially darkened , if it is , feather edges needs to remain natural. It does help in bringing a natural spotlight effect but we loose the environment.

Overall a great image . I like the wing position , which is spectacular.   Posted: 06/15/2026 13:17:37

 

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