Breakfasting at Our Restaurant

This Cooper's Hawk visited our yard on a recent weekend morning.  I suppose it was thinking, "what to have for breakfast?  Mouse...no, lizard--that's what I'll have!"  And so it was.

Kites

 

Yesterday evening I had a half dozen Mississippi Kites overhead.  I was lucky to be outside barbequing some very good chicken thighs.  Looked up while attending to all this; there they were.   Their aerial display, I noticed was about procuring their own dinner.   That’s the common thread in all this.

 

I was all prepared two decades ago to write my master’s dissertation on the “Life History of Mississippi Kites”.  Then I found that John K. Strecker had already done so.  None-the-less, I am still been enamored with this species.  Big red eyes, surrounded by black, set on a white face, really do make them look like bandits.  Yet, these are really fairly benign behaving raptors.  In fact, they feed on grasshoppers and locust and other flying insects.  Not the faire one might expect of raptors.

 

A diagnostic identifier is the first primary.  It is shorter than the second, making it very atypical of raptor wings.

 

Park Greeter at McKinney Falls

Red Tail Hawk
Photograph by Roy Smallwood

 

Following up on last week’s post, we were greeted by this individual just prior to the entrance to McKinney Falls State Park.  The park is just southeast of Austin.  It is a marvel that something as great as this park lies so close to a major city, but it does.

 Our Red Tail greeter has found a wonderful spot to hunt.  There were sufficient high perches as well as a fence line from which to draw his vantage points.  The field looked as if it would provide some tasty meals.

Lower McKinney Falls
Photograph by P Smallwood

Once inside the park we headed to the visitors center where we learned about Thomas McKinney and his family’s life on this ranch in the late 19^th century.  The original homestead is partly restored.  We could not get to it this day for the falls were flowing with the water from very badly needed recent rains.  Another day, perhaps.  No matter, we hiked and found other birds and flora.

Merlins

‘Tis the season for hawks and other raptors.  This time of year, if we keep an eye out, we will often see many species of raptors not resident to our area.  Driving the highways one often is treated to displays and spectacles of hawks in good numbers and frequency.  One our trip this New Year’s Eve, I was surprised to see a pair of Red Tail Hawks side by side on the high light pole of I-35.

Photograph by Bryan Stone, copyrighted

One falcon that has become a favorite visitor for me is the Merlin.  It is slightly larger than a Kestrel.  We most frequently see the females or immatures.  They are mostly dull brown, streaked breast, lack a facial pattern of note, have broader wings than kestrels, and the long tail characteristic of falcons.  This species likes open woodlands and wooded prairies and grasslands. 

The Merlin hunts small birds and rodents.  It will also take insects.  Unlike the kestrel it does not hover-hunt.  It catches its prey with a burst of speed without diving.