New Hawk Species 5/17/23
The sighting of a new species on the ranch is always an exciting occurrence. The new species was Swainson's Hawk ( Buteo swainsoni ), not only is this the first time I've seen this species on the ranch but the first time I've ever seen this species ever. I plan to make a post detailing all the Accipitrids sighted on the ranch eventually but I'll go into a bit of detail about the ecology of Buteo swainsoni in this post. But before that I'll give a short account of the sighting. I had just finished my morning walk and it was time for me to eat breakfast. Since I was done with my morning observations I had left my camera inside while I went outside to grab myself a microwave breakfast sandwich. Before I could look inside the fridge a large figure soared past my peripheral. I turned to face it, a large dark-brown bird with wide wings. My first thought was that it was a Turkey Vulture ( Cathartes aura ) but it was just far enough for me to ...