Prairie Falcon sending a message?
Friday, Dec. 5, 2025
Quincy, CA
The afternoon was approaching 2:00 p.m. Temperature had climbed all the way up to a sizzling 49oF. Bundle up, hop on the e-bike, go out “Hawk Alley”, see what’s there. Good stuff today.
Just around the block from my apartment complex, the resident sentinel at the high school baseball field.
Red-tailed Hawk
On the arm of the field lights pole.
Just past the baseball field, by now all of 4/10 mile from home, a very large flock of Canada Goose with one lone juvenile Snow Goose.
I’m not showing all the Canada Goose that were present, just trying to fix the incongruity with the Snow Goose in the picture.
Then, not more than ten yards from the congregation of the geese is a solitary and quite healthy looking Coyote. I didn’t even have to change my spot where I was standing to snap the next photos.
Pedaling very leisurely onward, I get another half mile and this Ferruginous Hawk stands out boldly against the brown grasses.
It flies off after a minute or so, but not very far. Just to the next convenient perch. Human words are scarcely sufficient to pay due honor to the majesty of this largest of North American hawks.
Found in prairies, deserts, and open range of the West, the regal Ferruginous Hawk hunts from a lone tree, rock outcrop, or from high in the sky. This largest of North American hawks really is regal—its species name is regalis—with a unique gray head, rich, rusty (ferruginous) shoulders and legs, and gleaming white underparts. A rarer dark-morph is reddish-chocolate in color. Ferruginous Hawks eat a diet of small mammals, sometimes standing above prairie dog or ground squirrel burrows to wait for prey to emerge.
--All About Birds
I am always so privileged when I can get a non-static shot. What a launch!
And oh lucky day, a second one, just another quarter-mile down the road.
Over the hump and down into the east side of the valley, at Hansen’s Pond this loner Bufflehead duck male.
Another couple tenths of a mile and I’m at my turnaround spot, but a female American Kestrel was there to allow me to top off the day.
Time elapsed from first photo to final photo of the day: 32 minutes. Gotta love this valley.
That’s it from me for now. What’s been up in your world, nature and environment-wise?
*****
|
The Daily Bucket is a nature refuge. We amicably discuss animals, weather, climate, soil, plants, waters and note life’s patterns.
We invite you to note what you are seeing around you in your own part of the world, and to share your observations in the comments below.
Each note is a record that we can refer to in the future as we try to understand the phenological patterns that are quietly unwinding around us. To have the Daily Bucket in your Activity Stream, visit Backyard Science’s profile page and click on Follow.
|
