tags: birds, Red-tailed hawk, Buteo jamaicensis, ornithology, Image of the Day
Red-tailed hawk, Buteo jamaicensis, in Central Park.
Image: Bob Levy, author of Club George. [larger size].
The photographer writes: The plaintive hawk-alarm call of a Gray Squirrel alerted me that a raptor was in my immediate vicinity. As I headed in the direction of the sound I scanned the open branches on the periphery of a meadow where from experience I have learned hunting hawks will often perch. In hardly any time at all I was looking up at a large juvenile female Red-tailed Hawk only about twenty feet off the ground. Although she periodically jerked her head from side to side to triangulate the positions of three squirrels foraging several yards away she did not attempt an attack. Her bulging crop indicated that she must have recently had a substantial meal and was not immediately ready for another.
For the next twenty minutes or more I was able to observe her freely from beneath the overhanging branches of an evergreen. I really did not need to hide. The hawk obviously knew I was there but that did not bother her. She continued to rest and digest her meal while giving two other observers and myself only an occasional glance. It is rare that I am able to get this close to a raptor with my point-and-shoot camera in hand. Now I wish I had stayed longer clicking away. But hey this image is a worth a few extra clicks. Zoom in and enjoy.
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How many hawks live in the city now?
p.s. Bob, if you're there: My mom says she hasn't seen any cardinals around all winter. Any ideas on what might have happened?
There are several breeding pairs of Red-tailed Hawks on Manhattan. I have personal knowledge of four but there more. I'll ask one of the "Hawk People," as they are widely known, for a better count.
Another mysterious disappearance of Northern Cardinals? As far as I know this species has been doing extremely well. They have been continuously expandng their territory. At this time of year however some folks have trouble finding them. This is most likely because family groups have broken up. The adults have driven off their offspring and courtship and mating have begun. It could be that the cardinals have gone into stealth mode because the adult females are already on a nest and the adults do not want to draw attention to themselves.
Predation is the number one reason cardinals may perish. In your immediate area it's possibe the local raptors have taken a larger share then usual. Have you had frequent sightings of Sharp-shinned or Cooper's Hawks? How about Merlins or Perigrines? These predators could account for the loss of songbirds.
I know just who to ask about the status of the Northern Cardinals. I will get back to you on this and the Red-tailed Hawk count.
An expert told me there are 23 Red-tailed Hawks currently on Manhattan and there soon will be more as nesting has begun. I read that the world famous celebrity Red-tailed Hawks are already "with egg."
As for the cardinal count I know of no reported decline at this time.
Bob - Thanks for the research. There have always been a few hawks in the area where my folks live, but not as many as there are out on the edge of the boonies where I live (I see at least one almost every time I go outside). Behind my parents' house there's a vacant couple of acres that's gone back to woods over the almost 40 years they've lived there, and occasionally they'll see a hawk perched on top of a tree, but that's about it.
As for the cardinals, I thought at first that some kind of disease might have wiped a bunch of them out locally, but no other birds seem to be affected. Maybe they just decided to camp out on another part of their turf for the winter. We'll see. I asked my mom to keep me posted.
I don't know where the 23 hawks number comes from, but I can attest that there are 7 known red-tail nests in Manhattan as of March 2008. There should be 8 but one couple has moved since last year and we haven't found their new digs yet. Another 1 or 2 are suspected but none of the hawkwatcher crowd has definitely found them yet.
Also, I have seen typical numbers of northern cards in my part of Manhattan of late. Heck, a couple days ago, I was watching one of the hawks and a cardinal lit up with his look-at-me chirp 10 feet away and nearly made me jump out of my socks.