Odd behavior?

Image Critiques Wildlife Critiques
1

462A0030V1.jpg
462A0030V1.jpg1800×1200 1.14 MB

Critique Style Requested: Standard

The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.

Description

Was shooting from my car when I noticed this grey squirrel suddenly stop, scratch a bare spot on the ground, rolled around on the bare spot and then took off. I have not seen this behavior from a squirrel before even though I have taken hundreds of squirrel photos. The park has both fox squirrels and grey squirrels. Both were in the area when I took this photo.

Specific Feedback

The squirrel was in shadow when I took this photo. Took some doing in processing to pull the photo out of the shadow.

Technical Details

Canon R7, RF 200-800mm @ 500mm
1/1250 @ F-8 ISO 6400

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2

I wonder if the squirrel has some sort of condition ( maybe a growth) that it needed to scratch that could not be done without the rolling around. Just a very wild guess. You really caught a great pose.

3

This is fascinating John. May be “dusting” itself for fleas or other parasites? There seems to be quite a bit of noise in the upper part of this that you might try to reduce a bit.