• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Bird call, hawk ID - Portland, OR USA (1 Viewer)

coltrv

Well-known member
This is a very bad recording. You’ll have to turn your volume wayyy up to hear the bird, and you still probably won’t hear it. It’s sort of drowned out by cars and other birds, but it’s in there, I promise. To me it sounds like an ascending zipper: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NUjLt1zQW7PjovtHYeZ7kDOrZvWzEg-k/view?usp=drivesdk
Also, is it possible to tell if this is a Cooper’s hawk or Sharp-shinned hawk?
 

Attachments

  • 320D950F-6523-4536-B080-87E52893DD45.jpg
    320D950F-6523-4536-B080-87E52893DD45.jpg
    13.2 KB · Views: 55
It doesn't look compact to me and the head projects far beyond the wings and the tail feathers are obviously graduated. I'm confident it's a Cooper's.
 
If more photos would help, I have a few more photos of slightly different angles:
 

Attachments

  • IMG_1875 (2).jpg
    IMG_1875 (2).jpg
    49.5 KB · Views: 22
  • IMG_1877 (2).jpg
    IMG_1877 (2).jpg
    52.3 KB · Views: 25
  • IMG_1882 (2).jpg
    IMG_1882 (2).jpg
    45.9 KB · Views: 22
Based on the first image in #1, I would definitely favour Coopers - (the rounded proportionately short wing and generally heavy appearance) - the first of the 3 other images shows a typical flight shape for Coops as do all of them. Sharpies typically glide with wrists bent forward and a ‘small’ head held behind the leading edge of the wings (although this isn’t a hard and fast rule). The second of the 3 images perhaps looks a bit like a Sharpie with the tapered hands but it also shows wide-ish hips and other Coop features! I find folded tail shape on flying raptors often misleading!

(edit just to add, FWIW, although the rounded tail can clearly be seen on the first image, this does not always work as a criteria to distinguish eg Coopers from Sharpies or E.Sparrowhawk from Goshawk imo as moult score, tail position, feather wear can all effect the distal shape although in this case, the image clearly shows the shorter outer retrices . From my own experience, I think it can be tempting to focus too much on tail shape at the risk of ignoring other structural ID criteria which are just as important such as overall proportions, wingshape, tail length etc.)
 
Last edited:
Certainly looks a “heavier” bird in the new pics! Am wondering if it’s a male, as compared to a family group that I saw some years ago now, two juv. females and a male, with the former being much longer tailed than their sibling brother?

Cheers
 
Absolutely a Cooper's Hawk. You can easily see the shorter outer tail feathers in the first picture. Nothing about this bird suggests Sharp-shinned to me.
 
Warning! This thread is more than 4 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top