Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Hawk!

Loons just posted below you !!

Sorry Jag, could not resist the tee up !

Hehehe. Tff.

I haven't tried loons.

Friend of mine, may he RIP, had a city slicker friend of the family always pestering him for some quail.

I went with him and his nephew quail hunting one day and he shot and breaste a big cock Road Beep-Beeper and a little later a Swan Sons (SP wink) too.

You'd think the breast of the S Sons would be much bigger. Barely bigger. Put them in a zip lock and that pm gave them to his buddy Lee.

Later told me Lee said they were delish rolled in flower and fried but the smaller one was a little chewy.

I'd venture an immature Cooper's. Not quite enough eyebrow for a GosHawk and a little large for a SharpShin. They are fond of quail

GosHawk.


Sharp Shin about pigeon size.


Mature Coopers

Hawk central around the hay patch.


One from yesterday, fairly tame young one.

Some great pictures!

I have had as many as 75 to 100 Hawks of various varieties circling the tractor when plowing out hay and wheat fields that have re-sprouted during their annual migration through TX.
They quickly wipe out any rabbits and mice that are hiding in the weeds and regrowth of hay and wheat.
They will keep circling until the last little bit of a field is plowed under. Pretty cool to watch them hunt.

There's a pair of red tails that raise a kid or two (usually see only one, this year I don't think any lived) somewhere in the neighborhood of my rancher neighbor's pivot fields down the road a couple miles. Always see them perched on the power poles watching that field.

Vultures and gulls, crows and ravens, and the occasional baldy or golden are seen out and about at haying time, no doubt picking off the dead and injured critters.

What the heck, "we" give them water to drink, flat open fields instead of sagebrush covered scrub land to hunt on, and power poles to perch and watch from. Or hay bales. Why not live here?

Here at the house......

Have 1-2 Coopers always hanging around

Most recently....moving water in the Kawi.....

Saw a p/dog in the low field.....17M2 & whack 'em....

Hadn't got back in the SxS yet...Hawk outta no where already on the ground on the dead dog

Twice now.prob the same Hawk....flying my drone behind the house....

Dammmmm

Hawk follows drone in & ready to strike in mid air

Would not be pretty.....

Pretty clear Coop I think, look at the streaking on the breast.

https://www.audubon.org/news/a-beginners-guide-iding-coopers-and-sharp-shinned-hawks

That’s a great grey owl, they’re all feathers Not much owl underneath. Small rodent specialists. A great horned can kick its a$$ every time.

UCMBDI's? OS, MR ducks.....

You see them beedy eyes? Oh yes, Them are ducks....

I’m gonna guess this last photo is a really good shot of an adult sharp-shinned hawk.

The diminutive proportions of the beak. On adult Cooper’s one of the field marks is paler feathers on the nape of the neck giving a capped effect to the top of the head. This bird has an equally dark nape.

Note too the squared-off tail.

But more’n anything that sharp (keeled) shin. I have never seen a photo that shows that more clearly.

JMHO

Cell phone from this morning. I need to buy a new camera.

Looks like it might be a juvenile Red Tail. Hard to tell without a view of the breast.

Juvenile for sure. No idea on what make.


Cheap entertainment from the cab!

Red-tails can be that dark, and that could be a juvenile dark phase red-tail.

But I’m gonna guess adult dark phase Swainson’s Hawk. That bird looks especially longed-winged, with a touch of chestnut on the wing. If that’s a small white patch above that smallish beak IIRC that would definitely be Swainson’s. Note that the tail of the Swainson’s below is backlit and so looks paler than the one on your sitting bird.



Plus sitting on a fence post in the open is exactly what Swainson’s do, even more than red-tails.

Swainson’s are actually built much lighter in weight than red-tails and feed largely upon crickets, grasshoppers and dragonflies. In the breeding season they takes small rodents.

Red-tails can beat up on Swainson’s but Swainson’s are light and long-winged enough the can hunt from the air more efficiently than red-tails. Red-tails need perches ie trees to hunt from. Swainson’s do better than red-tails where there ain’t many available perches.

Sitting still, mini sky diver.
(not my gate BTW, yellow rope?)

Had a Prairie Falcon visit this spring... Not to common here on the wet side of the hill...

Well, that sure looks like Swainson’s habitat.

The wings in your first photo are diagnostic to me, long and with a tapered shape.