Greetings everyone. I hope I can fill the rather formidable role of your regular Dawn Chorus bloggers. What follows is an article I've written for a local Vermont paper, the first in a monthly series of bird columns. I'm sharing it to share the experience of hawk watching:
Picture yourself on top of a mountain, having been watching for hawks throughout the day. It's hot. You've seen a few birds, here and there: a red-tailed hawk has come and gone, along with a flock of ravens that doesn't seem to be migrating anywhere. The trees nearby have flocks of cedar waxwings, yellow-rumped warblers and the occasional eastern towhee calls. A merlin (a small, aggressive falcon) has come and gone as fast as you can blink. An osprey or two has flown overhead and you note that once again, you have yet to see an osprey which is carrying a fish, an event which is a delight to hawk-watchers everywhere.
The article continues:
Someone shouts "eye bird" and points towards a gap in the trees. You spot it quickly, but are having trouble identifying it. One person shouts "coopers." Another insists that it's a sharp-shinned hawk. The group argues for a moment. The bird stops for a moment, spots the local red-tail and, even though roughly half-its size, charges the red-tail with a vengeance. The red-tail retreats to where it came from and the entire group, in unison, says "sharpie."
This is a typical experience of bird-watching on Putney Mountain.
After a few hours of this, it seems like it's going to be a slow day. But then you hear a yell from the rocks on the South side, about sixty feet away. It's the one word everyone's been hoping to hear all day:
"Kettle!"
Hawks are coming together, gathering in the sky.
"How many?" someone asks.
The counting starts.
"10."
A few more come in.
"20."
Then the trickle turns into a wave.
"50. 100. 150."
Soon enough, there are over 500 birds. Some are close to the ground. Others have already spiraled into the sky and are mere dots at this point. It's as though you had a tornado made entirely of hawks and flipped it over, with the widest part at the bottom.
What you've just seen is a broad-winged hawk kettle.
Broad-winged hawks (Buteo platypterus) are small, heavy winged hawks, with short tails, that show (in adults) heavy alternating black and white bands. They're a favorite among hawk-watchers due to the predictability of their migration habits and their tendency to come together in large groups in migration.
The physics involved are fairly straightforward: while larger birds (such as the American Bald Eagle) have the wingspan to move great distances simply through the power of their wings, broad-winged hawks have to rely on thermals: pockets of air that, as they warm, create an updraft. These are not uncommon over highways and parking lots, but the best place to spot them is coming from mountain tops.
The broad-winged hawks (commonly referred to as "broadies" by hawk watchers) will sometimes form in small groups, spiraling up into the sky to get better lift and velocity, but can quickly draw others into the fold, causing kettles that can range from a few hundred to several thousand birds.
If it's September, and you're on Putney Mountain, it's the whole point of the day.
I'm going to add a brief story. After writing and filing this column, we were shopping in nearby New Hampshire. As we left a store and walked into the parking lot I saw a large number of birds circling overhead. I had thought for a moment that they were turkey vultures, but it didn't take me long to figure out that they were, in fact, broadies.
Some of you know that I was sick for most of September so making the trek up Putney mountain (not a long trek, but a mile when you're ill and there are no restrooms is not good), so I hadn't had the chance to see a Kettle this year, and there had been one of over 1500 birds a couple days earlier, so I figured most of the broadies were gone.
But still, somehow, a kettle managed to come to me. It wasn't a huge kettle (20-30 birds), and it wasn't close, but it was still fun to watch. We chased it a little ways to another parking lot and I was able to get this photo, which barely scratches the surface:
So that's my humble attempt at a Dawn Chorus blog. I hope it's as well received as the others I've seen despite its alternative lifestyle (i.e., East Coast), but I'll take what I can get :)
A few quick notes:
- If you're interested in getting weekly or daily updates about my photos, I have an automated system which sends out a daily e-mail. You can sign up for it via this link. It's defaulted to a weekly archive, but you can change the settings for a daily post instead.
- All these images are smaller versions than the ones on my web site. Clicking on them gets you to the larger version which includes all sorts of detail.
- I am totally stumped at coming up with a good title for the weekly series. I suggested "Behind the Lens" but the editor wants it to be more specific to birding and every name I can think of is already taken ("Bird notes", "Bird Chat") or too obscure ("Whimbrel's Corner"). A friend suggested "The Bird Nerd" which she loves but I... well, don't. Does anyone have any suggestions?
- More info on Broad-winged hawks:
- Finally, feel free to use this as an open birding thread, post your own birding photos, etc.