As I was wrapping up my field work with the Nikon 1 V3 for my pending review I decided to visit Mountsberg Conservation Area in Campbellville Ontario to take some images of raptors. Mountsberg is the home of the renowned Raptor Centre and provides visitors with opportunities to get up close and personal with a good selection of raptors.

Note: click on images to enlarge

Mountsberg houses a selection of raptors that suffered from injuries and now make their home at the Raptor Centre.

Various educational programs are held, as well as demonstrations in a large flight enclosure.

There are also 16 km of trails, bird-watching, a small herd of bison, and several covered observation decks overlooking nesting areas and habitat for various water birds.

To take photographs of the captive raptors you’ll need a telephoto lens with a fairly short minimum focusing distance as some of the birds perch fairly close to the wire mesh of their enclosures. I used my Nikon 1 CX 70-300 mm f/4.5-5.6 and found it did an excellent job for me.

Lighting varies quite a bit and some of the exhibits are in heavily shaded areas so you may need to shoot at fairly high ISO’s, especially when the trees are in full foliage. Some of the birds are quite active within their enclosures, necessitating faster shutter speeds.

Technical Note: All of the images in this short article were taken hand-held with a Nikon 1 V3 and a Nikon 1 CX 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 telephoto lens. Images were produced from RAW files processed through DxO OpticsPro 10 using PRIME noise reduction. A DNG file was exported into CS6 and Nik Suite for additional adjustments as required.

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Article and all images are Copyright Thomas Stirr. All rights reserved. No use, duplication, or adaptation of any kind is allowed without written permission.