Red-tailed Hawk

RBG. Hendrie Valley, Burlington ON. March 8^th.2021. On this date last year, I walked a circuit of familiar trails and came up rather empty handed. I decided to walk it again today partly for the exercise and partly to compare experiences. Well, no surprise, many of my observations of last year were replicated today. I saw probably the same Eastern Screech Owl in precisely the same place, and there were plenty of Northern Cardinals, Dark-eyed Juncos and Black-capped Chickadees as expected. Some improvements on last year were Song Sparrows and American Tree Sparrows singing, maybe not lustily but singing and that counts for a lot.

 I’m sure there were many more newly arrived, male Red-winged Blackbirds this time and they were more optimistically vocal than last year. I did quite well with raptors starting with the Eastern Screech Owl noted above, then a fast flying and determined Cooper’s Hawk, a high overhead Sharp-shinned Hawk, two Turkey Vultures, two Bald Eagles and, My Bird of the Day, a sudden drop-in Red-tailed Hawk.

The red-tail came right at the end when I was standing talking to another birder, our conversation had drifted back in time and he was describing aspects of WW2 naval battles. Dramatic movement behind him caught my eye.  I yelled and pointed to this Red-tailed Hawk which had suddenly swooped in low to land on a fallen log just two metres off the path. It gathered its thoughts, hopped down, looked hopefully at the snow around it, hopped back up and left. I can only think it had a squirrel in its sights (unseen by us), swept in for the grab, and missed.

The faint barring on its tail indicates it is an immature bird, hatched last year and not yet a year old; perhaps that’s why it missed the squirrel.