Actually, Janie, I am struggling with processing myself and began to feel quite unhappy about not getting the look I am after for my images. But I am getting help now from someone for which I am more grateful than I can put into words...
Anyway, with these eagle images here is a simple way of sharpening them:
In Photoshop duplicate the background layer. Then apply Smart Sharpen to that duplicate layer with a radius of 0.3. Take the slider up to 40%, 80%, 100% or whatever, until you think the bird looks right. After you applied the Smart Sharpen add a mask to the duplicate layer and invert it so that it is black. Now set your foreground colour to white and with the brush tool and the opacity slider set to 60% (the one above the image, not the one in the layers panel!) paint holes in that black mask so that the sharpening you just did becomes visible in those places. Paint only over those parts of the image and those parts of the bird that you want sharpened. If you paint in too much, just set you foreground colour to black and paint over it again to cover it up. You can also change the opacity slider from 60% to a lesser amount if it is too much for some parts of the bird. That opacity slider works on the fly, meaning it affects what you are doing at that moment. Also, try to avoid the edges of the bird so you won't get sharpening halos around the bird.
I'm not sure if this is the correct way of doing it, but it's simple and it works well.
waiting here to get me some in Illinois 
