I Have A Hawk Hanging Around Right At My House

I set the Canon on a tripod, left it be, and put it in Movie mode so I could rip pics. I've yet to get a good "spread wings" shot, but it's my first day blowing the dust off of the Canon.

I won't post a bunch of redundant "owl in a tree" pics, but these are clearer that the earlier ones.
The 3rd pic is when he's just ready to launch himself. The ones after that are a blur.

 

Here are a few of the owl on the ground.
I have "normal owl," "owl hunkered down ready to launch," and "launched owl."







If I had a real internet connection rather than Verizon Wireless, I'd post the 6 minute vid of the perched owl looking around 360°, doing his best Linda Blair impression.

This 12 megapixel camera will be more than sufficient. I reduce most of my pics from 4mb to about 650kb before uploading here anyway because of my slow internet speed (and because you can't really tell the resolution difference on a computer screen.) Once I start going through the manual and learning how to really use it, I may buy myself a decent tripod as a reward. I have a cheap plastic tripod that's been sufficient, but the adjustment is jerky...the plastic binds and the elevation jerks in large increments rather than glides.

But I got some camera learnin' to do first. Right now, I'm afraid to change too many settings because I might not figure out how to get it back to "Normal." The sub-menus go at least to Dante's 5th Circle. Yeh, I'm Joe Tech all right...

 

When you have critters around like this, nothing else compares, huh Mary? I don't understand how you could have a snowy egret that far north!!! Buy him a cheesehead hat to wear back home! Otherwise, his friends will never believe him. That is insane. Regarding your barred owl, I've read they are curious enough that if you stand there and hoot at them, they just might come by to check you out.

Yesterday I was looking for a vid or pic of an owl getting a possum. Audubon (and others) list possum as part of the barred owl's diet. It's weird, because all the other mammals are small things like chipmunks & voles, and then there's "opossum" wedged in there. It doesn't qualify it with "baby" or "small" or anything. There was an adult possum loitering under my owl tree the other day and I know there were a couple of owls above it. I kept waiting for carnage, but it never happened. So I was skeptical.

I found a website that has animal carnage on it, and there was a brief vid of a barred owl taking a juvenile possum. And I've seen pics of them with other medium-sized mammals. So I verified that much. But I also came across a video of a blue heron catching a good sized live rabbit and swallowing it whole!!! I had no idea. It took a while, and the legs were still kicking, but he got it down. Here's the link:

Blue Heron Catches and Swallows A Rabbit

This is my Holy Grail:

 

My initial identification error seems to have been prescient. I went out with my camera this evening and a large bird flew off the tree and went ripping through the woods. Seemed kinda odd that the owls suddenly got skittish of me, and they don't tend to slalom around trees like that. Then I heard the cry. It's a hawk! I believe it to be a red shouldered hawk, although it may be a different species. For some reason I have a hard time identifying hawk species. Non-raptors are easier for me.

I'm still struggling to get decent pics. It's especially hard with the hawk, because he won't sit still.





After hunting from the owl tree, he flew to the end of the house. I wondered if he might be sitting in the other small tree that the owls like to hunt from. So I went inside, looked out the spare bedroom window, and took this shot:



I didn't crop it to give a sense of how close to the ground they've been sitting...can't be more than 6 feet.

Now I wonder if this bird will be back. I did not see any owls while the hawk was hanging around. I don't think they're enemies (apparently they will share the same nest in alternate years), but that doesn't mean they gotta socialize together.

 

Part of our encroachment actually increases habitat. I once read that creating subdivisions increased deer habitat because they are edge-dwellers; in other words, the more linear miles of cleared/wooded interface there are, the more deer habitat there is. On the other hand, the property next door to me (255 acres) did some timber cutting a few years ago, and that's when another pair of hawks got pushed onto my property. I have timber I've been told I could turn into money, and while I guess it's nice to know I have that resource, I don't need the cash.

Heck, I purchased this place specifically because I like to shoot, and when I saw all these critters, I didn't want to chase them away. There used to be a lot more hunting around me when I moved here in 2010, and I liked the idea of being a sanctuary...not that I'm against hunting, but I don't need to hunt for food, and I like attracting more things to watch. Not long ago there was a pair of young bucks with their mother in my back yard, and they were learning to spar. Well, one of them was trying to goad the other into butting heads. The second one wasn't that into it. They were almost like puppies.

Here's a hawk pic I just found while cleaning up the pics on my camera. Like so many of my pics, I took it while standing in my dining room:



This next one was pretty far away. You can tell the difference in "real focus" when the digital zoom kicks in...it's almost washed out



This one refused to cooperate:


Here's a wannabe:

 

I'm pretty much the same way. One of my younger brothers hunted quite a bit. Venison is good, if it's taken in farm country where it eats corn as a steady diet. I've wanted to learn how to dress out a deer, just in case I really have to do it to eat. But that's not gonna happen. If things come to that, all the game will be slaughtered en masse the first week by people who know what they're doing. There won't be any respecting property lines.

Regarding surviving on pine needles: I believe that Euell Gibbons did. Of course, it makes your farts smell like floor cleaner.

 

By the way: here are a couple of other pics I took through my patio door. I don't even have to go outside to hunt:

 

Why would your town mess with such a place? Are there people fretting that it breeds mosquitoes? I guess if runoff and overflow present a danger, but still...

My 1/2 mile long driveway cuts through a small thicket of woods. I don't know if it stays swampy or what, but during the right time of the year, the sound of the frogs is deafening. I roll down my windows as I drive through so I can get a better listen.

Regarding lizards, there are tons of "skinks" out here:

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They have all sorts of coloring...iridescent blue is my favorite. These are likely a large chunk of what the owls and hawks are snagging from under that tree. They are also what brings the occasional black snake on to my deck.