In flight with four-legged snack
Posted on 01/04/2016 7:09:44 AM PST by bert
It is a peaceful view. The driveway sprinkled with bird seed has several birds scoffing up the freebies. There are two pairs of cardinal and several White throat sparrows pecking their way around.
One female cardinal is sort of in a huff and tries to intimidate the other female cardinal while the males watch from the bush.
The sparrows are indifferent and pay her no mind. The wren that actually lives here watches from ontop of the van tire.
Suddenly in less than the blink of an eye, it is all over. The blue gray blur strikes and captures the huffy female cardinal. It is a Kestrel. It just sits there grasping the prey and covering it with slightly out spread wings. It look around and then looks around some more.
I rush to the door and take two steps and swoosh...... it is gone. It did not release the meal, the meal was carried off
I’ve seen crows here gang up on and fight a golden eagle mid-air. The crows won after two rounds.
...Saw a bald eagle grab a dead woodchuck off the road last year.He was working like crazy to get airborne...
Didn’t know bald eagles ate roadkill till I saw that on a county road too.
In flight with four-legged snack
A desperate pigeon with a nasty slash down its back slammed into the window of our van while we were parked at the gas pump. It landed under the van and sat still in shock.
Looking around and up, there was a falcon on the edge of the gas station roof, staring back as though it expected us to move out of the way so it could be about its business.
The pigeon’s injuries were fatal. The falcon moved on to another meal. A beautiful, skillful bird.
I once saw what looked to be a blue bird attack a sparrow or some other small bird. There were many other birds around and the noise they made during the attack was extraordinary.
The blue bird ( or whatever type of bird it was ) ripped the head of the other bird but did not consume the bird. Just left the head and body laying where it fell.
Had never seen anything like that before.
Mockingbirds, kingbirds and jays go after crows and hawks. The crows go after hawks and owls in mobs.
The smaller birds are probably more aerobatic that the ones they go after - a kingbird will take on a crow, but a kingbird that took on a falcon or an accipter would be a dead kingbird. There was a kingbird who dove at me everyday when I passed its nest, aggressive little creature.
I wonder if we got our word “hawk” from the crows. They have a special cry when they mob a hawk: it sounds more like “Awk! Awk! Awk!” than “Caw! Caw! Caw!”
I was at a friends when a small hawk slammed down on a starling eating seed in his driveway. The small Hawk about 14 inches tall stood on the starlings wings pinning him on his back.. The starling thrashed and fought while the hawk was riding it.. HAMMERING his head into the starlings chest. The Starling pecked and clawed at the Hawk but really couldn’t reach him well. After a minute or two the hawk got thru the chest of the bird and ate his internals.. he just kept hammering at him eating him.. 30 minutes later there was just a round circle of feathers on the drive.. maybe a bone here and there. I have often found those feather rings outside.. but I never realized exactly what happened there until now.
Kestrel is a fine-looking animal:
My second favorite bird, next to the Osprey, which I used to get some great photos of during my years spent up in your area at Lake Shasta.
Thanks for the excellent picture.
Neat! A pellet gun range...
Many moons ago, I was fishing a pretty good stretch of river. Came up over the edge of a deep cutbank, and ran into a bald eagle who was fishing pretty intently as well.
He was on a branch overhanging the river and was as close to me as you are to your computer monitor right now. We both let out a squawk and decided that we had other places to be.
Going eye-to-eye with an adult bald eagle, unexpectedly, in the wild, and at arm's length, is quite an experience. They're darn big birds!
Simple: the larger raptor has nowhere near the dexterity and maneuverability of the small blackbird.
Swans kill baby geese by breaking their necks or drowning them.
“I once saw what looked to be a blue bird attack a sparrow”
________
If it was a house sparrow it had it coming. They kill bluebird eggs, nestlings, and even the adult bluebirds in the nest, and take over. But the bluebirds can fight back if they have an escape route - a two-entrance nestbox.
I have a 6 mo JRT. Fantastic dog, more love and personality than all the other dogs I’ve had combined.
So far, only killed 2 tables, a chair, and 3 rugs (and 25 pounds of rawhide chews). I am looking forward to when he moves on to non-stationary targets.
Mr. niteowl77
My wife has always had bird feeders in our backyard; when we lived in Ohio, we had a small yard but kept the feeders full and lots of small birds dropped in for a meal.
One winter day, just after a snow, my wife looked outside, expecting to see a flock of small birds feeding. Instead, the yard was empty. Then, she saw a slightly larger bird sitting on our fence. It was an American Kestrel, looking for its next meal. Our backyard remained empty for a couple of hours after the Kestrel left.
Last year I saw an adult eagle and, I believe, two juveniles working on a dead snow goose that had got stuck in the ice in the lake in front of our house.
Interesting. I've seen those feather formations and wondered the same thing.
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