skua

Pomarine Jaeger on the tundra near Barrow, Alaska.

This individual was particularly aggressive in defense of its territory. I squeezed the shutter release then ducked quickly. Its mate, a dark form bird, wasn't in the least bit interested in dealing with intruders.

The Goswick skua was distracted by a passing insect when I was shooting it.

Taken from the car. It just sat there quite unconcerned.

In the breeding season it pays to wear a crash helmet (You, not the Skua)when in their vicinity. Also called a Bonxie

Oo'ps, chopped a bit of its tail off

You can see why the Arctic terns puke up their catch with this bearing down. Hounding a tern colony on Amsterdamoya, Svalbard. Light morph

Long-tailed skua near nest site at Blomstrandhaloya in Svalbard. Note the tiny geo-locator on its left leg attached to the 'FS' identifying ring.

Pair of Arctic skuas lifting off

Could this be an Arctic Skua. A very hurried snap as it flew past just metres away-camera at waist level and click.

I think its a Great Skua or Bonxie

A good day at Brokdorf/Elbe. Three arctic skua and the big one at the same time :)

Photo taken in its breeding areas in the mountains of Northern Norway, Troms county in June 2011

These birds are breeding this year due to lots of rodents in the mountains, elegant fliers!

While I was at Snettisham to watch the knots at high tide on the beach was a skua that came in looking the worst for wear and landed next to what looks like a dead pink foot goose. This was taken on the Monday 4 Jan 2010

Great skua about to take off. Some wingspan it's got.

A real elegant bird from the Norwegian Mountains

Or there again Brown skua, does this bird have an identity crisis?

Falklands Skua - Catharacta [skua] antarctica subspecies antarctica, AKA Southern Skua -Stercorarius antarctica.

This from the mountains of N. Norway where they breed in years with rodents available - so not this year.

Great Skua is a major predator in the arctic

Shot taken in one of the many fjords of the Province of Nord Trondelag in Norway. I was very happy to come out with some decent shots of these very fast moving bird.

My first post - Taken whilst on holiday in the Shetlands - we were in a boat and the Bonxies took a liking to digestive biscuits