I walked the tail waters of a dam and found over 100 eagles perched in trees along about 200 yards of river. At least I believe they were all eagles. More were farther down stream. The first shot is just to show you how many filled the trees.

My Nikon 300 mm zoom wasn't strong enough to get me shots I really wanted. The VR feature was helpful but the lens just couldn't bring in the raptors to a large enough image. I ended up with two shots that were OK. If I was real excited about them I would photo shop out the branches that appear in the frame.

It certainly gives me an appreciation for those wonderful images people on this forum post.

Any comments?

Sorry, here are the photos...

WOW i have never seen so many Eagles at once. Thanks for posting these . If your using a 70-300mm VR nikon lense you may want to pair it with a kenko DG 1.4X Tcon , i use mine quite often to get that little bit of reach thats missing at times.

Knight, I've been considering the 1.4 teleconverter after this photo outing. Have you tried the 2.0 and if so what were your thoughts. I currently have the following 50/1.4, 18-200 VR & 70-300 VR. I'll probably pick up the 70-200/2.8 VR when I can make the financial plunge.

I have a 2x Tamron also but i rarely use it, its not as quick to focus as the 1.4X and you loose a good 2 stops of light with it.

Ohmigosh, and I just returned from a 800 mile round trip, to see eagles. I probably wasn't too far from Des Moines, on my way to Missouri on I29. I like the eagle in flight shot.

Mike, I remember you telling me in another post you were traveling to Missouri to visit a nature reserve. How did the trip go? I considered going there over Thanksgiving but didn't leave the state. The above photos were from Red Rock, about 45 miles southeast of Des Moines.

Jeapers, Mule! That first one is terrific - never seen a sight like that. In fact, I've only seen one in my life.

Love how the two are in flight while approaching the tree :thumbsup:

Loupey, just to prove I wasn't joking about 100 in 200 yards, here is another shot of these great raptors in the trees. As I would get a little closer they would all take off. I had very blury shots of two eagles playing in the sky, their talons grabbing at each other while they would briefly fall. It was fantastic to watch but the shots were terrible. I guess it provides motivation to go after them again.

Beneath the tree you might expect some frozen fish dinners...

Red Rock, eh? I have to add that to my ever growing list of places I must visit someday. So do they congregate like this only this time of year? Sorry, I'm not very knowledgeable on eagle behavior yet.

What an amazing site (nice pun right :p )

Very nice opportunity Mule and you definitely did the best you could. The first shot looks awesome... and to be honest... I wish I had a crop shot that looked as good as either of the last 2... but I need to opportunity first lol.

I know that all the "Canadian" Eagles have migrated south now... could this be a resting place during the migration?

Love that first image Mule :thumbsup: .

Cassie.

These are migrating eagles and this is probably prime viewing time to catch them. During the "off" season it is not uncommon to come across one or two below the dam but we only see these numbers for about a month during this time of year. They really put on quite a show.

Damb that's alot of eagles you lucky.......