JOURNALIST and wild life photographer Jacques Sellschop of Marina Beach has been out and about checking on and photographing the crowned eagles in his area.
He is pleased to report that the San Lameer juvenile is now four months old and doing well, as is the ‘Paulsburg’ juvenile, a month older and in a nest not far from San Lameer. While he was at the nest in San Lameer Jacques spotted and was able to photograph the adult male in flight, just after it had delivered a ‘dassie carpaccio’ take-away to its youngster.
“These birds don’t understand light and the photographer’s ‘golden hour’ prescription, so they perform in the harsh rays of the midday sun, thwarting one’ s best artistic intentions,” said Jacques.
The crowned eagle, an uncommon species, is one of southern Africa’s largest and most powerful eagles. A forest dweller, it can be found in the well-treed eastern regions of South Africa. Its prey includes dassies, monkeys and even small antelope. The San Lameer eagles have successfully raised quite a few chicks and have become South Coast celebrities. They have even appeared in a prestigious birding magazine, thanks to Jacques who monitored, photographed and wrote an article about their rearing of one of their chicks.
When Jacques captured these latest, exquisite images of the eagles in action he was using a 600mm Nikon lens with a 1.4 converter, on a Nikon D4.
