Being in Hokkaido for my annual Hokkaido birding wildlife photo workshop tour means spotting and photographing The White-tailed eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla). The White-tailed eagle measures from 66 to 94 cm (26 to 27 inches) in length with a common wingspan of 1.78 to nearly 2.5 meters (5 feet 10 inches to 8 feet).
First time wildlife photographers who lack experience in birding and wildlife photography may misunderstand how challenging it is to spot, and capture the perfect wildlife image. You could be on Hokkaido photo tours for 10+ years and never get a shot like the ones I’m sharing with this newsletter. Some run of the mill photo workshop agencies declare that the Steller’s Sea Eagles (Haliaeetus pelagicus) and White-tailed eagles are essentially everywhere in Hokkaido and easy to photograph, and that all the locations where the eagles are can be easily reached by a tour bus and on any of the roads criss-crossing Japan’s northern island. As a Hokkaido local, I can tell you that all of this is false.
Many times on my annual Hokkaido birding photo tours, the eagle or another raptor-like its cousin, the Steller’s sea eagle, won’t descend, and you then shift your focus to different locations on the pack ice trying to capture another photo opportunity. For the first photo in this newsletter, I spotted the White-tailed eagle just as it had homed in on its prey, and I felt it would descend like a predatory lightning bolt from the sky plunging into a small opening in the ocean in pack ice to claim its prey. It’s times like these that separate the experienced wildlife photographers from the photographers that are still learning their equipment and developing their skills. So few photographers, only a handful I know, can get so up close and personal and have the knowhow to get the shot. Many participants on my annual Hokkaido photo tour, take comparable if not nearly identical photos to the ones attached to this newsletter, and that is why my workshops are usually sold out, two years in advance, Hokkaido 2023, and Hokkaido 2024 are sold out and, Hokkaido 2025, is half sold out already.
Most wildlife conservationists know that White-tailed eagles have the largest wingspan of any eagle, and I’ve been up close and personal countless times, so I believe it. The only other eagle that is more massive and has just as impressive a wingspan would be the Steller’s Sea Eagle, one of the White-tailed eagle's opponents, on Hokkaido’s pack ice. I have seen both White-tailed eagles and Steller’s sea eagles huddle on ice floes during periods of extreme cold to share warmth, but this camaraderie is always short-lived. White-tailed eagles and Steller’s sea eagles are perpetually hunting in the pack ice for prey, and as soon as a fish is spotted by these birds of prey, the eagles that were once huddled for warmth become bitter enemies, exchanging angry barbs and slashes with their beaks and talons catching prey and then fighting even harder to preserve it from the other hunters on the pack ice. Whether hunting for fish or other prey, huddling for warmth, or engaging in aerial combat with Steller’s sea eagles, White-tailed eagles make a breathtaking photographic subject, one I enjoy introducing to visiting local and international photographers.
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