A Handsome Visitor

I had a handsome visitor come to my house this week.  He just flew in all breezy and silent, and didn't want anything to eat (he already caught something along the way).  And he didn't stay long ... the handsome ones never do ;)  but he allowed me to take a couple of photos to show you ... he's quite vain!  His name you ask?  Well, Cooper ...  Mr. Cooper Hawk.

 

This beauty lives in my neighbourhood and I see him often.  Usually when I don't have my camera close by.  He's so fast!!   Swoops past the windows and up into a tree and Poof! ... gone before you have a minute to really admire him.  These photos were taken through the window and then I touched them up a bit to see him a bit more clearly.

 

 

I just love the birds of prey.  My son saw a Great Horned Owl out in our fir tree late one night over the holidays.  He said he heard him hooting, looked out the window and saw the owl sitting in the tree.  I didn't realize these owls were in my area, but I'm so thrilled that my son saw him.  I used to see a Great Horned Owl in the woods where I grew up.  I would go down into the woods with my little Kodak Instamatic camera trying to find him, but never did get a photo of him when I had the camera with me (of course!).  But I saw him plenty.  Usually I just followed the sound of the crows cawing because they loved to harass him when he was all sleepy from a night of hunting.

 

 

This Cooper's Hawk has been in my neighbourhood for quite a few years now.  It may be a pair that I see, but I can't tell the difference between a male & female, and I've never seen two together.  At any rate, I feed the little birds with the seeds, and I guess their noisy chatter draws him in and he enjoys one of the little birds (or rabbits) for a plump meal :[  Such is life.

 

I'm in the flight path of a large marsh along the shores of Lake Ontario, and we see lots of migrating birds here even though we're in town.  One day sitting in the backyard with my son after school, we happened to look up and saw quite a few turkey vultures flying over.  They migrate south too.  Well we watched quite a few before I realized there were an unusual number of them, so we started counting.  We counted over 150 turkey vultures and about 20 pairs of hawks that were circling and soaring along on the air current with the vultures!!  It was a really special sighting for us, and I've never seen the likes of it before or since.  They must've had a particularly good air stream they were being carried on and were quite high up.  sigh ... so wonderful ;)

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

Wendy