mthew

See how that outer tail feather is so much shorter than the central feathers? Coopers have tails usually described as rounded at the tip; this is why. Of note because Sharp-shinned Hawks have a straight edge to their tail fan. I’ve written a new Medium piece… on raptors!

This snaggy perch can be a good place for Merlin, but in this case it’s an adult Coopers Hawk. Ready for some stretching… Oh-oh, stand back! Coop poop.

This scappy specimen may be explained by the damaged foot.

It’s fruiting body weather.

Finding a nutty something on the ground, this Red-breasted Nuthatch wedged it into some bark and began to work out the meat. Looks like this has happened a few times here. Note sure this is the same bird. But it sure is a pale specimen.

Judging from the number and freshness of sap holes, this crab apple is visited often by Yellow-breasted Sapsuckers.

Ubiquitous yet elusive… the three-alarm fire of winter is fairly camera-shy, but in this case I happened to be below the bird on a slope.

A sapling… Hawthorn, I guess. The spine and twig swellings suggest galls to me, but I haven’t tracked any causative agents. Hawthorns, genus Creteagus, have a colorful taxonomic history. Find a century old tree book and you’ll see hundreds of species in North America alone. In the northern hemisphere, there were supposed to be about…

Deja vu all over again? Recently, on this very antenna, a Merlin was eating. But this is no Merlin: The queen of all she surveys. There have only been two day this year that I haven’t seen this female American Kestrel on her patch in my neighborhood. (Well, I presume she’s the same bird.) She’s…