Acrobatic Red Kite Photography in Wales

A lovely spring day and what better way to spend it than photographing Red Kites in the heart of Wales! The Red Kite is always one of those birds I never tire of seeing. Having nearly been extinct until recent years, they’ve made a remarkable comeback thanks to a major conservation drive across Wales and the UK. Now, a true symbol of Wales; being the national bird, it’s fair to say they’re doing great.

My main aim on this outing was to capture something different from the norm. Having recently acquired a new camera body, I thought I’d put it through it’s paces with these fast flyers. They’re renowned for their acrobatic skills, so I wanted to catch them switching into a dive swooping for carrion. Beautiful sunshine really helped me up the shutter speeds and make the stunning plumage stand out as they turn to face the sun.

These guys are super fast and thankfully the way I set the camera’s AF up, helped to track them in flight and keep focus throughout the shots. Now having ten frames per second motor-drive is a real blessing when shooting birds like this as it really gives you a lot of choice when it’s comes to post processing.

Once I knew I’d bagged some good shots, starting playing around with low shutter speeds (1/80 second) and trying to capture movement in some images, not 100% sharp but it’s more of an impression of colour and motion.

When these birds turn, it can create some real abstract poses, some of which shown below.

And I thought the below image was interesting, the bottom Kite staring at it’s dropped scrap of meat (just see it in front of the tree trunk) as it’s chased by another Kite.

All images on this page taken with Canon EOS 1D Mark IV, EF300 2.8IS & 1.4x II Extender