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Discussion of other Raptor species; their anatomy, biology, ecology, etc.
Topic Started: Sep 16 2007, 11:04 AM (18,140 Views)
Raptorman
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Patti
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Bea, I saw what I thought was a Red-shouldered hawk this past Monday on West Loop Dr. Saw it well on the underside, flying low...strongly banded tail black/white tail and beautiful orange underside---for lack of a better way to describe the call...it is sort of like key-you key-you and I could still hear it at my house when I got home.

Yet the bird you show does not have such strong tail banding, and the wing markings are not as distinct as the Red-shouldered. I've seen that well from a telephone pole on West Loop on another occasion. Very strong markings.

Bill: Bea and I live in the same neighborhood. My dad was aware of Cooper's hawks in our area because they would kill his pigeons and the Red-shouldered don't (according to the man who takes care of my deceased dad's pigeons).
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Raptorman
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ostrich2
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Raptorman,Sep 21 2007
09:55 PM

When on the wing or being defensive the buteos and a long drawn-out scream sounding voice compared to the very rapid, staccato like repetitive vocalization of the accipiters. Buteos have relatively slow wing beats and slow voices. Accipiters have rapid wing beats (often followed by a glide when not chasing potential prey) and rapid voices. They both can have similar sounding voices when food begging, etc. but on the wing they are quite distinctively different.


A while back I found a link to this clip of a red-tailed screech which really sounds like what you describe. It's also exactly what I've heard when occasionally seeing red-tails on the property at work.

Red-tailed hawk
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Raptorman
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r.e.s.
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Raptorman,Sep 21 2007
06:55 PM
Peregrines were actually killed by government command in Britain during the wars to protect the Carrier-Pigeons bringing important messages back from Europe.

Interesting, and I wonder if it might explain something I read a while back ... In this article there's a reference to a "hawk war" as a cause of the decline of spotted eagles in Europe ...

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The lesser spotted eagle is the most numerous species of eagles in both Europe and Estonia. A hundred years ago, the species was not as common as today, and their numbers further decreased during the first half of the 20th century as a result of the “hawk war”.

When I first read that, I was puzzled what it meant by "the hawk war", but after reading your comment, I wonder whether this is just another reference to the same war-time killing of raptors to protect the carrier pigeons. (?) Or was there some other kind of "hawk war" in Europe?
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Raptorman
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r.e.s.
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Bill, thanks for your reply -- seems like a reasonable explanation.
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ostrich2
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Bill, are owls ever flown as falconry birds? In Ontario it appears that the GHO and the snowy owl are considered by the government as legal falconry species, although I'm not sure whether they are ever flown in practice.
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Raptorman
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ostrich2
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I seem to recall now that there was mention of snowy owls at the Toronto airport several years ago - I can't remember now if that was as part of trying to discourage unwanted birds or animals away from the runways, or it might have been another species.
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Raptorman
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ostrich2
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I found this reference

Impact of Raptor Predation on a Declining Vole Population

Unfortunately the entire reference is not accessible online, but it does mention snowy owls:

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At Toronto International Airport, four species of raptors, red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis), rough-legged hawk (B. lagopus), snowy owl (Nyctea scandiaca) and short-eared owl (Asio flammeus) are present during winter.  In winter and spring of 1974-75, pellet analysis and direct observations showed than meadow voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus) made up 97-100% of the diet of these four raptors


I think I am going to look up to rough-legged hawk to see how they compare to the red-tailed - I have often seen large raptors near the airport and have always assumed they are red-tails, even if I can't see the signature tail that well. I wonder whether some could be rough-legged hawks.
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ostrich2
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Here is another tidbit I found by one of the authors of the above study:

James A. Baker M.Sc. 1977

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For my M.Sc. I studied the numerical response of raptors and vole populations on Pearson Airport. This project was conducted in response to a snowy owl getting sucked into a DC 8 engine. There were other close calls with raptors such as red-tailed hawks, rough-legged hawks, and various owl species. We discovered that high numbers of raptors were preying on dense populations of meadow voles on the grass areas adjacent to the runways at the airport. The manner in which the grass was cut led to excellent vole habitat.
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Raptorman
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