Catching Up!

A number of Red-shouldered Hawks called loudly to one another above the Watch today, as if a family in interaction.  This photo shows the diagnostic "windows" in the outer wings. Multiple bands in the tail, and squared off ends on the wings.  Look at the distinct Curve and elbow on the forewings, the overall darkness of the body and inner wing with a "checkerboard pattern along the back wing.

Our numbers remain sad when it comes to BW hawk kettles/numbers.  This has been a strange year, but not surprising really, with the heat and clear skies.  But when we have such a great promising day as today...well, we were disappointed to not see kettles.  But the numbers of other hawks slipping through were exactly what we expected, and kept us busy searching the skies. 

Jimmy caught up his posts to TN-bird, and in spite of some overlap from my last post, I am including it in it's entirety.  With a note that we are so sad to hear of Mr. Coffey's passing. We must be thankful for the years he kept us in communication through Tn-bird.

Jimmy's post for today:
"SMHW
Hamilton co., TN

Sunday 9-25
Counters Bill Holt and Jimmy & Cynthia Wilkerson.
Not much going on as we tallied 11 Broad-winged Hawks
1 Northern Harrier and 1 Cooper's Hawk.

Monday 9-26
Counters Jim Rowell; Roi & Debbie Shannon and Jimmy
& Cynthia Wilkerson
We almost had more counters than hawks.  We were
rained off the lookout at 12:45.  We counted 6 Broad-
winged Hawks and 1 Northern Harrier

Tuesday 9-27
A warm welcome goes to Bob Ingle from Murfreesboro.
Counters included Jim Rowell; Bill Haley; Ruth Ann
Henry and Jimmy & Cynthia.

Jim Rowell was at the lookout at 8:15.  There was 100%
rainy cloud cover.  Other counters started arriving as
early as 11:30.  We all had high expectations for large
numbers of migrators to pass once the cloud cover changed.
We again had low numbers but a greater diversity which
was a welcomed change.  At 3:52 Jimmy spotted a hawk that
he thought might be a Peregrine Falcon due to it's pointed
wings.  Bill was quick to point out that it looked that
way due to the angle Jimmy was seeing it.  It actually was
another Broad-winged Hawk but, this hawk was followed by
another Broad-winged that was extremely dark in all the
right places to become our first Dark Morphed Broad-winged
Hawk for this season.  This Dark Morph was indeed a special
hawk and helped enhance spirits of all who were present.
The book "HAWKS IN FLIGHT" has the Dark Morph listed only
being seen as one in ever fifty thousands hawks.  We haven't
checked records yet but feel this may be the third possibly
fourth one spotted in our 24 year history.

Tuesday, 9 27, 2016
Hawk totals for today were 10 Broad-winged Hawks; 6 American
Kestrels; 6 Sharp-shinned Hawks; 1 Cooper's Hawk 2 Northern
Harriers; 2 Osprey and a single immature Bald Eagle.  All day
we kept seeing Bald Eagle adults, as many as 7 at one time but,
they were all considered part of our local resident population.

For the season we are at a low of 1279 Broad-winged Hawks being
it is already so late in the season.  Tomorrow could be our
best day for 2016.  Conditions look right except that we will
more than likely have to pull hawks out of a clear blue sky and
the prevailing wind direction predictions all contain some form
of winds from a westerly direction.  West winds are not the best
winds to have for our site.  Several of the hawk watches in upper
Virginia are still counting hawks in the 3 to 4000's.  Quite
possible the big picture for us is not as bleak as I imagine.

Keep Looking Up,
Jimmy Wilkerson
Hixson, Hamilton Co., TN"

a footnote ~

Pelicans against a cloud,  countable.



Pelicans in the blue sky...Can you count 26?

 

Broad-wings are so small that trying to make this example is rather difficult. But the Pelicans were quite large, and still are tiny and blurred out against the blue sky.  Now imagine them moving.  The top pic is when they flew into the cloud, and were of course more easily seen.  We had seen them from much closer.  But in the time it took me to get the camera out, they had climbed into the thermal to quite a height.  This is what we see a lot as BW's rise on thermals. But sometimes, this is what we much count, when we find them already at great heights.