Birds and Nature

This is just a brief video clip of the adult Zone-tailed Hawk I photographed yesterday while it was perched in a tree. Not much action, just how this bird looked around and up to monitor it's surroundings. SeEtta

Yesterday I spotted a Zone-tailed Hawk perched at mid-day in the thicket at Frontera Audubon in Weslaco, TX. I did not get a usable photo as the hawk flushed right after I got a reasonable look at it. So when I returned at dusk to see if this hawk would return to roost I tried to be even more careful as I try hard to avoid flushing perching hawks and especially if they are likely going to roost. I didn't find it at Frontera but in the area. Darn this is a spooky bird--with a split second after I spotted it, this hawk spotted me and flushed again. Arggh. Today I returned to the area around Frontera Audubon and again spotted a Zone-tailed Hawk perched. This time I was even more stealth and managed to get all of these photos and got to watch it for about 15 minutes. It really watched what was happening around it, looking around and up in the air repeatedly. Right after a vulture flew in close to it the Zone-tailed Hawk flew off, whether or not bothered by the close fly...

When I looked more closely with my spotting scope at this Zone-tailed Hawk at El Zacatel, I could see it was in juvenal plumage. The bottom pic shows the tail up close so the dark irregular bands on the dorsal (upper) surface are visible. And on the far left of the tail feathers is one tail feather showing the ventral (lower) surface that whitish with dark black bands (only 2 visible). Note the 2 wingtips that are showing below the tail feathers, another feature of this species is their wings being very long. Also note the jaggedness of the tail feathers--I also saw this on the juvenile I followed as it perched and roosted at Frontera Audubon. I suspect this is the same juvenile bird because this location is less than 10 miles from Frontera, well within range for foraging for such raptors, and the ragged tail feathers would be consistent. The bottom pic (head is turned away from camera so viewing back of head) shows white on it's head, lots of white showing because the ...

Two days ago I drove by El Zacatel where a series of resacas provide excellent habitat for a good diversity of waterbirds, waterfowl and other species especially when there has been enough rain to fill them. Though some are dry now due to the drought there is still enough water to draw a lot of birds. Shortly after I arrived I spotted a hawk perched in a deciduous tree that looked very familiar--when I checked it with my binoculars I saw it was a Zone-tailed Hawk. Interestingly this location is about 10 miles from Frontera Audubon Center where I found and followed 2 Zone-tailed Hawks. Though not a known location where they are found as was Anzalduas County Park but it is only a few miles from the Rio Grande River and Mexico. Clearly shown in both pics, the head and body are blackish. The bottom pic shows the white lores, black bill, and bright yellow cere as well as some of the umderside of the remiges that are gray with dark barring (the latter not well visualized). The top ...

Short video clip of the juvenile Zone-tailed Hawk I spotted perched in a deciduous tree in the El Zacatel,TX area. The hawk demonstrates a high level of attentiveness to other birds/etc around it as it turns repeatedly to look around providing nice views of it's plumage and characteristics. Video can be enlarged to fit screen for close-up viewing by clicking on box in far bottom right above. More in posts above. SeEtta