Osprey? Broad-winged hawk? (1 Viewer)

I took both of these pictures along the shore of a small lake today in northeastern Missouri. At first glance I thought that one of these two may have been an osprey, but now I'm not so sure. Could the first one be a broad-winged hawk? I wish I'd had binoculars with me, but my girlfriend would only take me to the lake if I left them behind (no birding! she said), but I at least got my camera along with me. The first one was much more distant than the second bird, but it definitely looked much smaller than the turkey vultures that were also in the same area as the sky. Any help is appreciated...I'm really horrible at hawks still.

I'm no expert on your hawks, but I'm pretty sure these are both buteos. The pale underwing and banded tail of the first bird certainly looks good for Broad-winged Hawk. Your second seems to be a Red-tailed Hawk.

The second bird is a Red-tailed Hawk. You can just see a reddish tinge to the tail, but the diagnostic identifying marks here are the black or dark markings on the leading edges of the front of the wings - called patagial marks. All Red-tails have this, no matter what color morph they are! I learned this a few years ago at a local Audubon Society lecture on Red-tails and am now able to ID them much more easily.

I'm pretty sure the first hawk is a Broad-winged - the shape of the wings and white band on the tail are correct for this species, but I don't have much experience with them! They only pass over us in migration and usually in kettles.

I have a great Peterson field guide for hawks called "Hawks of North America" 2nd ed. 2001, by William Clark and Brian Wheeler. ISBN: 0-395-67067-5 $22. Perhaps you can put it on a gift wish list!

Good luck with your birding hobby. You should try and get your girlfriend interested - its much more fun when you bird as a couple!!

Yes, I agree, the first hawk is a Broad-winged and the second is a Red-tail. I have that Peterson Hawks of NA book also and I think it's pretty good but I've found the DVD 'Hawk Watch' to be much more helpful. It's put out by Brownbag Productions and actually shows clips of the hawks in flight and explains how to tell them apart.

Yep, Broad-wing and Red-tail.

Girlfriend says no birding, hmm....

My girlfriend isn't anti-birding, she's just against birding every single time we go anywhere outside. I guess I'll just have to learn to deal with it until I start driving again in a few weeks ;-) She's actually getting into it now...I got her to put together a life list the other night even. Anyways, thanks for the help with the hawks. I was hoping for an osprey (don't have one yet), but the broad-wing hawk was one I didn't have yet either, so I still got a new tick today!

A good tip on Ospreys is that, especially at first or at a distance, they tend to look more like a large Gull than a Hawk. They have quite a similar shape (long pointed wings and short tail) and an almost similar flight action.

Their flight can also look very like a Grey Heron (and so, I suppose, a Great Blue as well). The first ever Osprey I saw was when I was least expecting to see one. It was coming at me head-on and I initially thought it was a Grey Heron. I only kept looking at it because something didn't seem "quite right". I nearly dropped through the ground when it dawned on me what it really was.