With the large numbers of eagles at Conowingo since Thanksgiving, and numerous eagles spotted by Herb Houghton at Plank Road and Rio Reservoir, I thought today would bring some eagles to Croton, New York. Nothing personally viewed by myself, although one park visitor claimed to have seen an "immie", and another took a nice photo of a single adult male.

No eagles for me today, but plenty of hawks flying - Red Tailed and Rough-Legged. I was able to get some BIF shots of a beautiful female Rough-Legged Hawk. Her black marks at wrists, and pale streaked chest and broad dark belly were quite evident.

Happy Holidays to all FMers!! C&C Welcome.

GENE

1. Rough-Legged female about to stoop.

2. Rough-Legged female BIF.

3. Rough-Legged female perched - broad dark belly, and white tail dark band featthers evident.

Nice shots of this bird Gene,

I've never seen one in the wild, so thanks for the thread. The markings are very different from hawks I've seen.

Great images Gene and this confirms a hawk I had seen and was unsure what it was, now I know This hawk seems to have a short body or smaller than the RTH?? At first glance for me I thought it was a harrier by the head but very nice underwing markings on these.

Great in-flights, thanks for sharing and ID on it.

Karl

I would love to see one of these! they are so beautiful. you did a great job on the BIF shots. The only thing I could suggest is to crop with more room in front of the bird (in the direction its going). thanks for sharing!

Great captures well done Eugene.

Garen

That is one extremely pretty raptor. Your in flight shots show him off really well! Nice work on those!!!

mark fadely wrote:
Nice shots of this bird Gene,

I've never seen one in the wild, so thanks for the thread. The markings are very different from hawks I've seen.


Thanks for the kind words, Mark. The underwing markings are truly unique. The only other raptor that I can think of with such distinctive underwing markings is the immature Golden Eagle with its' " headlights" (of course they are WHITE patches).

GENE

Karl Witt wrote:
Great images Gene and this confirms a hawk I had seen and was unsure what it was, now I know This hawk seems to have a short body or smaller than the RTH?? At first glance for me I thought it was a harrier by the head but very nice underwing markings on these.

Great in-flights, thanks for sharing and ID on it.

Karl


Appreciate you comments, Karl. When perched and viewed from the front it is somewhat similar to the Red-Tailed Hawk - they both have brownish streaks on a white chest, but the Rough-Legged Hawk had a solid dark brown belly.

GENE

Sean Bellay wrote:
I would love to see one of these! they are so beautiful. you did a great job on the BIF shots. The only thing I could suggest is to crop with more room in front of the bird (in the direction its going). thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the kind words and suggestion, Sean. You are quite right, they are truly beautiful!

GENE

GAREN wrote:
Great captures well done Eugene.

Garen


Thanks for the thumbs-up, Garen.

GENE

Great captures and such a beautiful Hawk.
Dan

Brenton Biggs wrote:
That is one extremely pretty raptor. Your in flight shots show him off really well! Nice work on those!!!
Thanks for the very nice comments, Brenton. Viewing the underside of this raptor, when fully illuminated by sunlight is a truly remarkable site. The contrast of the black wrist marks and the white underwing feathers is brilliant! Brenton, I believe this hawk was a female (as viewed through binoculars), due to extremely white underwing feathers, only single dark band on tail feathers, and nearly completely dark brown belly.

GENE

Very nice in flight shots Gene. This bird has lovley markings and you captured it well.
Martin

Great series Gene!

Very nice Gene.
Harsha

Hi Gene,

Deborah Allen and I think you have a juvenile (first-year) RL Hawk at Croton. The tail band on the underside of the tail is light (grey) and not dark (almost black). This is characteristic of young RLs. Adults have a black terminal band (males darker than females; and adult males have a few more thin bars on the underside of the tail than do the adult females). As in most raptors, females are larger than males...So we think you have a young RL - but we cannot sex it based upon your photos (size is difficult to judge in photos). Your final photo of the RL (perched showing top side of tail) shows a strong (dark) tail band...if (for whatever reason) the underside tail band was this dark, then we would agree that you have an adult female RL...but all your other shots indicate to us you have a first-year bird, sex unknown...We would say you have a light morph bird too...(Bill Clark might call it an intermediate morph - since there can be much lighter RLs.)

Several RLs now appearing in the area - Meadowlands (NJ) seems to have several...at least one place in the Bronx has a light morph annd a dark morph.

Best Wishes,

rdc/nyc

Sweet shots of this guy! i can't help but notice that in some poses he/she looks like an owl almost
They have beautiful underwing markings!

Nice shots
Too bad about the sunburn on some of them, but still a nice series

Never seen one of these, thanks for sharing. Digging the in flights.

Tim

Very nice BIF shots Gene... 3, 4, and 6 are my favorites, I really like #3.
Well done.

Kirk

Martin Good wrote:
Very nice in flight shots Gene. This bird has lovley markings and you captured it well.
Martin


Thanks for the kind words, Martin! What raptors have you viewed in Switzerland? Have you seen Golden Eagles? Are raptors common in the mountains?

GENE

Tony Tanoury wrote:
Great series Gene!

Thanks for viewing and commenting, Tony!

GENE

harshaj1 wrote:
Very nice Gene.
Harsha

Thanks for your kind words, Harsha.


GENE