Date: 8/29/25 10:23 am From: Clayton Will <willcfish...> Subject: Re: [ia-bird] Chasin' squirrels...
We had a faceoff some years ago on the back fence between our
Red-shouldered Hawk (who was a regular for two Winters) and one of the many
Fox Squirrels! The squirrels usually ran the top of the fence. It would
repeatedly bluff charge the hawk, then stand and scold! The Red-shouldered
was unphased! Caught it on video and after five minutes the squirrel
disappeared over the fence! Nature is fascinating!
On Fri, Aug 29, 2025, 11:51 Merle and Marsha Hall <mghall...>
wrote:
> This guy showed up in our neighbor's backyard yesterday morning. Marsha
> saw him and I grabbed the camera and followed him around up and down the
> alley. He kept trying to catch a squirrel, any squirrel, but was never
> successful. I bet he tried six or eight times and failed every time.
>
> Immature Sharp-shinned Hawk, best I can tell from the description on the
> Cornell site: " Very thick, rufous stripes that extend down the lower belly
> are a good indication of Sharp-shinned Hawk, and very thin, dark streaks
> that fade away on the lower belly are a good indication of Cooper’s Hawk."
> and "The size of the head relative to the body can be a reliable field
> mark....usually a Sharp-shinned Hawk’s head looks small, and a Cooper’s
> Hawk’s head looks large. Sharp-shinned Hawks appear short-necked; Cooper’s
> Hawks appear tall." Though it also says Sharp-shinned are smaller than a
> crow and this guy was bigger than that.
>
> I didn't get any great photos. These are pretty cropped as I tried to stay
> far enough away so as to not interfere. Would've liked to get one of him
> and the squirrel, but missed. At one point, he was up and down on the other
> side of a small berm and came to rest where he is in that photo with the
> Hosta leaves. At that point, the squirrel comes out from behind a parked
> car and saunters by not ten feet from him. He just sat there. Maybe he
> was just practicing? The Cornell description says their diet is mainly
> small birds, so who knows. These were probably young squirrels, but they
> had him beat.
>
> Merle
>
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