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Over the past couple weeks I happened to get a couple decent in-flight photos of two species of hawk very difficult to distinguish: Sharp-shinned Hawk and Cooper's Hawk. The first photo is a Sharp-shinned Hawk I photographed flying over Nalle Bunny Run Wildlife Preserve on 1/9/2021. The second is a Cooper's Hawk flying over Lake Creek Trail in northwest Austin on 1/16/2021. The main differences these photos show are the angle of the wings and size of the heads. The Sharp-shinned often holds its wings pitched just a little bit forward and has a smaller head, protruding out in front of the wings less. The Cooper's usually has wings held more straightly out to the sides and has a larger head protruding out in front of the wings more.
I can only speculate. They have similar ecological niches, both specializing in hunting other birds in the woods. So they both have broad, rounded wings and long tails. Why such similar plumage? They may have also had a common ancestor, and speciated as two different populations found slightly different specialization.
Taken while recording the January virtual bird walk on Hill Country Conservancy's Nalle Bunny Run wildlife preserve.
Taken on Lake Creek Trail in Williamson County.
Comments
Nice comparison and description. Thank you!
Thanks Susan! I realized I had the two recent photos and thought they made a good opportunity to write a little bit about them.
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