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Busy Falcons

© Steven Haywood Yaskell

Walking near open fields or a park, have you ever seen a short, rapidly-flying and dodging bird whose movements and color looked like a pigeon's. Only it rose up a few hundred feet and started flying in place?

Chances are you saw an American Kestrel - a.k.a, the Sparrow Hawk.

The first thing I did when I first saw this "hawk" was to discover it wasn't a hawk at all. It's a falcon. A main difference here is that their tails don't fan out in flight and they have pointed wings, unlike hawks. Falcons are ordinarily smaller than hawks, too, and this size can cause me to confuse Sparrow Hawks with doves for a moment whenever I see them.

Their flight when moving fast is so pigeon like that it is disconcerting. Just when you think you are seeing a dove in flight (say, the native tan Mourning Dove or a small Rock Dove - a.k.a the "pigeon") you see a bird of prey, instead. For Sparrow Hawks are animal hunters - unlike the bird that begs popcorn in the parks like the Boston or Salem or Lynn Commons. When falcons like the Sparrow Hawk stop in mid air and start to hover, they see something living on the ground they want to catch.

Sparrow Hawks live year round in most of New England. The male in profile, seen through binoculars as it perches, is quite striking. On the head, look for vertical black stripes and buff and white patches and wings of two-toned rusty red and metallic blue gray. The female is similar; however her wings are rusty red. I saw a male recently off on an early morning hunt, his long, thin tail wagging up and down while clutching a dead oak branch. Across a wooded field dotted with three large, tall dead trees, each about two hundred yards apart, he made his way, the tail a-wag at each stop after a jagged, nervous, jerky burst of flight.

At such times, these birds are quite busy, nervously flying and twitching about, hunting. Sometimes they hover in mid air. This male moved first from one tree, then to the next a few hundred yards off, then on to the next, this last one about five hundred yards from me. At each tree he was staring down, probably seeking movement in the grass for any prey that might happen along. It is not uncommon to see them harassed. A Flicker (a woodpecker-like bird) and some doves seemed unmoved at his presence on the third tree, though the brave Flicker rose up once to contest his being there after awhile. The Sparrow Hawk reared up, wings flattened back, head down in a challenge. Two Blue Jays appeared and took turns flying up to him, but kept clear of his talons and beak. He challenged these birds in the same way. Some crows arrived and the Sparrow Hawk was forced off. It moved in no particular hurry, it seemed. Small sparrows and wrens in a radius some hundred or so feet around the tree began to stir as soon as he was gone. In flight, I have seen Sparrow Hawks assailed by angry sparrows and blackbirds.

The copyright of the article Busy Falcons in Massachusetts is owned by Steven Haywood Yaskell. Permission to republish Busy Falcons in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.