Deathstrike

It's easy to admire birds of prey when you see them.  I've taken photographs of sparrowhawks before (click on the label at the bottom of the post) and their appearances around the garden have been more frequent in the past weeks but as far as we've witnessed one has never managed to take out a bird around the feeders.

On Friday, one got lucky.  Terry took these photos after witnessing a sparrowhawk crash into the kitchen window with it's prey gripped in it's claws.  Fortunately, I had left the camera in the kitchen as I had been taking a few shots of different birds on the window feeder before I left for work.  He managed to snap a couple of pics before the bird took off with the blackbird it had grabbed on the wing.