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Mystery Hawks
Aug. 14th, 2005 09:16 pmSometime last week, on a humid evening with a high bright overcast, I went out for a walk. It was very sticky, but at least not hideously hot, as it had been for an interminable time. I was bored with all my usual walks, so I decided to go check out the lovely rampaging wild garden at the corner of 35th and Pillsbury. Besides being beautiful in itself, it provides endless narrative interest as one sees which pieces of it are firmly under control for the moment and which have gone mad and overflowed their bounds.
It looked pretty tidy this time. The front yard, which is not very large, was full of shrub roses, semi-restrained brambles, purple coneflower, phlox, and coreopsis. The boulevard had a glorious section of native sunflowers, an ignominious mown one where something had gotten out of hand, and a tangled collection of hairy bellflower, daylily, motherwort, ragweed, lambsquarters, and oxalis. The back yard was harder to glimpse because the fence was higher, but I was admiring the six-foot thistle that was blooming right over the fence, when I became aware of a background noise of whistling and screaming. It sounded more like a children's party with exceptionally melodious noisemakers than anything else. I went on down the 3400 block of Pillsbury Avenue, which is fortunate in still having seven or eight very large and ancient elm trees in good health. Swooping and whistling amongst their upper branches were about a dozen birds, large birds. I finally saw one silhouetted against the bright gray sky, and immediately thought, "Hawk."
I walked around craning my neck, and found three large flat nests that didn't look like crows' or squirrels' nests. The whistling and screaming went on. I could see the birds moving around, but the bright sky and the dark street made seeing much of anything difficult. I finally descried a bird sitting on a branch over the middle of the street, preening its breast feathers. It seemed to have a dark-gray slaty back and some white on its underside, and it did have a raptor profile when it turned its head briefly.
I went home to get the binoculars, but by the time I had done so it was too dark to make going back worthwhile.
I leafed through Sibley, looking particulary at peregrines, since we have a fairly thriving introduced population downtown, but I had not seen enough to be able to make an identification.
The next day it rained. I went back anyway, with the binoculars. I could hear the screaming two blocks away. I fell in with a pleasant fellow from the neighborhood, who told me that the health of the elms had been paid for and fought for repeatedly by the Lyndale Neighborhood Association,, that the hawks were nesting in the back yards of several residents as well as in the boulevard trees, and that he wondered if they were rough-legged hawks. One kindly landed in a river birch, much closer to the ground than the huge elms, and we both looked at it through the binoculars. They kept steaming up because it was humid; rain dripped all around. The bird was wet and kept shaking itself. The tips of its tail feathers looked as if they had been dipped in white paint, and it had stripes or rows of spots on part of its upper breast. The underside of its tail was mostly white, but we kept thinking we saw a rufous undertone and then deciding that maybe we didn't.
I went home and looked at the bird books again, but was no wiser.
This evening I went back, with binoculars. It's a clear day and was sunny then. I spent some time looking at two birds perched side by side on a very high branch of one of the boulevard elms. They were grooming themselves. They had dark stripes on the undersides of their tails, stripy throats, very definite white spots on the tops of their wing feathers, exceedingly white undersides to their tails.
I went home and looked at the bird books. They did look a bit like rough-legged hawks. But rough-legged hawks are allegedly here only in the winter. And they didn't look all that much like them. They didn't look all that much like anything, except some kind of hawk.
I am a terrible bird-watcher, but I do enjoy myself.
P.
It looked pretty tidy this time. The front yard, which is not very large, was full of shrub roses, semi-restrained brambles, purple coneflower, phlox, and coreopsis. The boulevard had a glorious section of native sunflowers, an ignominious mown one where something had gotten out of hand, and a tangled collection of hairy bellflower, daylily, motherwort, ragweed, lambsquarters, and oxalis. The back yard was harder to glimpse because the fence was higher, but I was admiring the six-foot thistle that was blooming right over the fence, when I became aware of a background noise of whistling and screaming. It sounded more like a children's party with exceptionally melodious noisemakers than anything else. I went on down the 3400 block of Pillsbury Avenue, which is fortunate in still having seven or eight very large and ancient elm trees in good health. Swooping and whistling amongst their upper branches were about a dozen birds, large birds. I finally saw one silhouetted against the bright gray sky, and immediately thought, "Hawk."
I walked around craning my neck, and found three large flat nests that didn't look like crows' or squirrels' nests. The whistling and screaming went on. I could see the birds moving around, but the bright sky and the dark street made seeing much of anything difficult. I finally descried a bird sitting on a branch over the middle of the street, preening its breast feathers. It seemed to have a dark-gray slaty back and some white on its underside, and it did have a raptor profile when it turned its head briefly.
I went home to get the binoculars, but by the time I had done so it was too dark to make going back worthwhile.
I leafed through Sibley, looking particulary at peregrines, since we have a fairly thriving introduced population downtown, but I had not seen enough to be able to make an identification.
The next day it rained. I went back anyway, with the binoculars. I could hear the screaming two blocks away. I fell in with a pleasant fellow from the neighborhood, who told me that the health of the elms had been paid for and fought for repeatedly by the Lyndale Neighborhood Association,, that the hawks were nesting in the back yards of several residents as well as in the boulevard trees, and that he wondered if they were rough-legged hawks. One kindly landed in a river birch, much closer to the ground than the huge elms, and we both looked at it through the binoculars. They kept steaming up because it was humid; rain dripped all around. The bird was wet and kept shaking itself. The tips of its tail feathers looked as if they had been dipped in white paint, and it had stripes or rows of spots on part of its upper breast. The underside of its tail was mostly white, but we kept thinking we saw a rufous undertone and then deciding that maybe we didn't.
I went home and looked at the bird books again, but was no wiser.
This evening I went back, with binoculars. It's a clear day and was sunny then. I spent some time looking at two birds perched side by side on a very high branch of one of the boulevard elms. They were grooming themselves. They had dark stripes on the undersides of their tails, stripy throats, very definite white spots on the tops of their wing feathers, exceedingly white undersides to their tails.
I went home and looked at the bird books. They did look a bit like rough-legged hawks. But rough-legged hawks are allegedly here only in the winter. And they didn't look all that much like them. They didn't look all that much like anything, except some kind of hawk.
I am a terrible bird-watcher, but I do enjoy myself.
P.
