A hawk

 

Off in the distance.  Standing on a treetop.  I can’t tell what it is with the binoculars, so I put the camera on it, set the zoom to maximum, and try to get a couple good photos through the roadside brush to take home and figure out on the computer.

 

Here are the I.D. photos I come up with.

 

 

It’s brown and streaky, so it’s a juvenile.  That doesn’t narrow it down at all though.  There are a lot of hawks in the area this could be.  There are red-tailed hawks around.  If it was a red-tailed hawk, the wingtips would be about as long as the tail, so it’s not a red-tail.  There are a lot of white-tailed hawks out around the agricultural fields, but if it was a white-tailed, the wingtips would be even a little longer than the tail, so it’s not a white-tailed hawk.  There have been swainson’s hawks passing through on migration.  There may still be a few around, but swainson’s all have at least a little bit of a bib on their chest, so this isn’t a swainson’s.  The wingtip to tail length looks about right for a broad-winged hawk, but the streaking on the chest doesn’t look quite right.  If it were broad-winged, the chest would look more barred than streaked.  It’s not a kite, so I’ll exclude all of those.  It could be a northern harrier, sharp-shinned, cooper’s, harris’s, or red-shouldered.  The tail looks a little long for a northern harrier and the head isn’t shaped right.  It’s too small to be a sharp-shinned.  If it were a cooper’s, the tail would be much longer.  Harris’s hawk juveniles aren’t brown and streaky like this.  The tail might be a little short for a gray hawk and the chest streaks should change to spots by the time they get to the belly.  It’s pretty close for a gray hawk, but I’ll exclude that too.  There are red-shouldered hawks all over the country, and their appearance varies geographically, but eastern red-shouldered, that’s got potential.  The tail length is about right for a juvenile.  The tail from the top side should have broad bars on it and I can see that a little.  The chest should be evenly streaked.  Okay, that’s it.  I’m going with juvenile red-shouldered hawk.

 

The funny thing is though, with all my careful analysis, I’m still not sure I’m right.  There is a lot about juvenile hawks that makes them all just kind of look alike!