I am NOT an authority on raptors, but that has never stopped me from commenting before, so here's my guess:
I think the first blurry photo looks like a dark type of Red-tailed Hawk more typically found out west. I think the second and third photos are of a different bird with a feather missing from primaries on each side. The only species of Buteo around here with such a wide bold white stripe in the tail is Broad-winged Hawk, which also shows a black outline to the ends of the flight feathers on the entire wing, as seen in the third photo. However, dark-type Broad-winged Hawks are rare, and the wing shape looks too long and rounded to me, so I'm not at all confident. I hope someone who really knows what they are talking about has a look at your photos and sets me straight. --Dave Nutter On Jun 15, 2014, at 03:23 PM, Ray Zimmerman <r...@cornell.edu> wrote: > Today around 12:30pm as I stepped outside (in Eastern Heights, Ithaca) the > call of red-tailed hawk caught my attention and I quickly spotted it circling > overhead. As I grabbed my binoculars, I soon realized that it was a very > unusual red-tail (at least very different from the one’s I’m used to seeing). > As you can see from very bad photos linked below, it was quit dark below. > > So is this a western bird, or is this just a variation I haven’t seen around > here before? > > https://www.dropbox.com/sh/t7pw5hoifjpzeey/AABcyimp4JipHTo8DwZc0r8-a > > — Ray > > > -- > > Cayugabirds-L List Info: > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm > > ARCHIVES: > 1) > cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html'>http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html > 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds > 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html > > Please submit your observations to eBird: > http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ > > -- > -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
