^u^ Another of the little bird portraits I've been working on--can't help but make more.

This is a Northern Shrike, a hefty predatory bird of the northern half of the eastern half of the US and Canada (though mostly in Canada). They mostly go after large insects, lizards, and small rodents, and have the interesting habit of keeping their catches hung up on thorn bushes... like a butcher's meat freezer. ^w^ They're birds that save their bacon.