There was a country show this weekend at upton country park so i strolled down with the camera gear.

Just sifting through the 390+ photos now, some are rubbish and some are just the same thing more than once, theres some great ones in there though. I thought having a longer lens would make life easier when taking pictures of birds of prey in flight, still really struggling though, the AF is too slow if it loses track and thats very easy to do at a long FL, the damn falcons are just too fast, 60+mph within a couple of feet of you is virtually impossible. Hawks are a little easier but still hard and they tend to try and fly out of the sun, which is a problem as pointing an slr at the sun is never a good idea.

Any tips on taking photos of the flying birds would be appreciated, i guess it may be luck in a lot of cases but i could use any help. I do find that i can use both eyes tracking the bird with one and checking the focus through the view finder with the other which is handy.

Pictures will be up soon..

Try to fill the frame with the subject; theres a lot of distracting background in the bird pics; if you cant get close enough with your lens then crop. Also I think it looks better if you get down level with the subject; theese look as if youre standing in a crowd looking down at a bird on display, just that and that alone.
The dog action pics are good.

Worth treating most bird photos as portraits too, turn the camera on its side. In the first pic about 4/5ths of the area is irrelivant. Horse, you could have moved a little bit to the right, personal choice though. Pictures are all nicely focussed on the subject and otherwise good.