The Arizina-Sonora Desert Museum here in Tucson, AZ is one of the prime zoological sites in the world. It consists of exhibits of plants and animals found in the Sonoran Desert which covers 120,000 square miles in the southwestern part of AZ, The southeastern part of California and the State of Sonora, Mexico. All of the animals (and other critters) are displayed in natural settings and one of the best is the daily raptor free flight exhibit. The birds are totally free but are trained to respond to their handlers signals. On the day we went the birds that flew for us were a Great Horned Owl and a family of Cooper's Hawks. The birds have no tethers attached and seem to delight in flying low and fast over the spectators. (warms the cockles of my fighter pilot heart!) They fly so close to you that one of the hawks actually brushed my hat with his wing. Part of the drill is that the spectators cannot put anything higher than their eyes so as not to get in the way of the birds. The birds are fed bits of meat hung on dead trees very close to where you stand and this made for some great static shots. If you plan to visit Tucson and would like to get this close to some of our areas raptors, check the Museum's web site for when the flights operate as they shut down for the summer months.

The Arizina-Sonora Desert Museum here in Tucson, AZ is one of the prime zoological sites in the world. It consists of exhibits of plants and animals found in the Sonoran Desert which covers 120,000 square miles in the southwestern part of AZ, The southeastern part of California and the State of Sonora, Mexico. All of the animals (and other critters) are displayed in natural settings and one of the best is the daily raptor free flight exhibit. The birds are totally free but are trained to respond to their handlers signals. On the day we went the birds that flew for us were a Great Horned Owl and a family of Cooper's Hawks. The birds have no tethers attached and seem to delight in flying low and fast over the spectators. (warms the cockles of my fighter pilot heart!) They fly so close to you that one of the hawks actually brushed my hat with his wing. Part of the drill is that the spectators cannot put anything higher than their eyes so as not to get in the way of the birds. The birds are fed bits of meat hung on dead trees very close to where you stand and this made for some great static shots. If you plan to visit Tucson and would like to get this close to some of our areas raptors, check the Museum's web site for when the flights operate as they shut down for the summer months.

That's a very nice series Shaun. We were there in early March and the museum puts on a fantastic free flight program. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who wants practice on close-flying raptors. There are several handlers who place bits of meat on branches alternating on different sides of the viewing platform. Thus the birds fly just inches over your head. Anyone interested would be best served with a medium zoom such as a 70-200.

I would offer a correction on your I.D.'s. Your third beautiful portrait is a Gray Hawk. The last of the "group-hunting" birds are Harris's Hawks. They do indeed hunt in groups. There were some distant wild Cooper's hawks the day we were there. The Gray Hawk spotted them and quickly flew back to the safety of his handler and wouldn't take off again.

Thanks for sharing your photos.