Without a witness to a kill, certainly can't say for sure. We were shocked to walk out and identify the carcass after the hawk left. Its always possible that the Coopers succumbed to ANYTHING else and redtail just found the carcass first. (it was not warm/pliable when we went out 30 mins after noticing, but otherwise little to judge time of death was left). IF the RT was responsible for the kill, possible theories could be the Coopers had some injury/illness to affect its awareness? Our group in Bosque watched a crane succumb to disease, going from normal-looking bird to struggling to legs-in-the-air- feeding-ravens in under 5 minutes). Another scenario we considered: The Coopers and sharp-shinned hawks often approach this feeder (or at least nearby shelter to ambush the feeder) across several hundred feet of open grassland in a straight glide, low to the ground. Cooper could have been flying in focused on prey, with redtail ambushing from the nearby roof or aerial position. Cooper could have even seen the redtail and not considered it a threat, however, as we'd witnessed over the past weeks, this redtail has been seen taking a blackbird off the feeder so perhaps has developed a unique skill? Nice excitement for a snowy afternoon!
Skot On Mar 14, 9:22 pm, "Leon Bright" <[email protected]> wrote: > COBirders, > > Skot Latona's photo of a red-tail dining on a Cooper's Hawk with the > possibility that the red-tail killed it, runs counter to my understanding > that Cooper's are too agile to be caught by red-tails, under normal > conditions. Have I been mistaken in holding that concept, or are some large > buteos quick enough to grab a medium-sized accipiter? > > Leon -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds". To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/cobirds?hl=en?hl=en Visit the CFO Website at: www.cfo-link.org
