On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
It’s Albatrossity Monday!
We have the final parts of the great Jordan Trail series, and then we close out the week with an introduction to the Southeast Asia series.
Albatrossity
Our extended period with snow-cover made it more of a challenge to get outside and find some natural beauty to photograph. But I did find some subjects before the next cold snap hit. Mostly raptors, but a few ducks and one passerine tossed in. Enjoy!
One of the most common, yet somehow also one of the most overlooked, birds of winter here in Flyover Country. Flocks of American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) roam the countryside, picking on road-killed critters, harassing hawks, and (my favorite) tumbling and playing over the grasses on every windy day. Feeding flocks in the stubble fields can number several hundred, but all of them have a few sentry crows, keeping watch from trees or fenceposts. Nobody is going to sneak up and surprise these guys. Click here for larger image.
Unlike the crows, Northern Shrikes (Lanius borealis) are uncommon (but expected) winter residents here. The smaller Loggerhead Shrikes (L. ludovicianus) have pretty much disappeared here as a winter bird, and are also much less common here even in summer. There are lots of hypotheses that attempt to explain these range shifts, but so far, no answers. Click here for larger image.
The advent of large flood-control reservoirs in Flyover Country in the 1950s and 1960s has also changed the avifauna. Prior to that, there simply was not enough open water in the region to attract ducks or geese (the state of Kansas has only one natural lake). Those days are gone, and we can enjoy duck-watching in the winter, especially if the temperatures are mild and the ice stays off the reservoirs. These Common Mergansers (Mergus merganser), male at bottom and female at top, are here every winter now, and sometimes in quite impressive numbers. Click here for larger image.
Another elegant diving duck who graces these parts in the winter is the Common Goldeneye (Bucephala clangula). This one sports a rakish pointed crest, courtesy of the omnipresent Kansas wind. Click here for larger image.
All of these ducks are constantly scanning the skies for raptors, especially Bald Eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus). This is another species that was exceedingly rare prior to reservoir construction, but now is quite common year-round. This adult was scanning the duck flocks to see if there were any slower ducks, which could then end up on the menu. Click here for larger image.
Red-tailed Hawks (Buteo jamaicensis) have become a passion of mine, and photographing them is perhaps my favorite activity here in the winters. We have many variations of this species; indeed, every bird is different. This image, and the next four are all variations of the subspecies known as Harlan’s Hawk (B. j. harlani), for example, and there are four other subspecies that can occur in this region in the winter season. Migrants from the far North (as far away as Alaska), these birds are spectacularly individual, and easily recognizable. This bird is unique (check out that skull-like plumage pattern on the head!), and that uniqueness has allowed me to track her arrival and departure every winter since the winter of 2019-2020. Click here for larger image.
Harlan’s Hawks are best identified by their tail patterns, which can be white, black, gray, rufous, or some combination of those. Here’s a nice example, on a dark-morph bird. Click here for larger image.
Young Harlan’s Hawks (hatched out a year or less ago) can be quite striking, especially the dark ones, because that bright yellow eye stands out even more than it does on lighter youngsters. Click here for larger image.
Besides the dark-morph birds that most birders associate with the name Harlan’s Hawk, there are lighter versions as well. The underside of this bird looks pretty much like many typical mid-continent redtails, white with a darker bellyband. But that funky tail tells you that this is a Harlan’s Hawk, and a beauty. Click here for larger image.
The final bird illustrates the point that just learning subspecies and morphs of Red-tailed Hawks is not enough. There are also intergrades! That’s the technical term for offspring of pairs where the parents come from two different subspecies (if it is two different species, the term for such offspring is “hybrid”). I have lots of angles of this bird in other shots, and the consensus is that this is an intergrade whose parents were Harlan’s Hawk (B. j. harlani) and Krider’s Hawk (B. j. kriderii). Click here for larger image.
sab
As a not very knowlegable bird fan I am glad you like crows because I do too. A lot.
European folklore makes them out to be evil. Native American folklore makes them out to be very intelligent and mischievous. I think that is the more accurate view
ETA I am sad. I never knew our corvi were not corvus corvus but some other type of corvus.
Donatellonerd
Thank you. i really needed this post this morning.
AM in NC
Thank you for your amazing photos and the knowledge you share with us. It’s hard, though, not to anthropomorphize the birds when they seem to show such character in their portraits! And the hawks are simply stunning.
SteveinPHX
Thank you for the photos.
zhena gogolia
That bald eagle photo is heartbreaking!
Winter Wren
The variations in the red tailed Hawks are amazing.
J.
Always enjoy your posts. Love the hawk shots.
sab
@zhena gogolia: We have a local valley scenic tourist train. It goes by some bald eagle nests. Last time I was on the docent mentionned that in recent flooding a huge eagle nest fell out of its tree, so the park people could examime it. 18 cat collars, and that was just the cats with collars.
My hairdresser pointed out that cats are unusual in that they are on rhe food chain as both predators and prey. We can tell that at home. We have seen. They spend their days hunting and being hunted by each other. Nobody gets killed or eaten, but they spend every waking hour (all two of them) on the hunt or avoiding capture.
eclare
Love the Common Goldeneye and his Mohawk!
Kansas only has one natural lake? Huh.
stinger
Spectacular set of photos! I, too, love crows!
MCat
This is spectacular! I love birds. Thanks for sharing these great photos. I learn so much from your posts.
Redshift
@eclare: Around here, Virginia has only two natural lakes, and apparently Maryland has none.
Redshift
Yesterday was the first time this year we’ve had what I call grackle-palooza, hundreds of grackles in the treetops at sunset in our suburb, chattering away and making a tremendous racket. Probably because it was fairly warm after a long stretch of cold.
martha
Thank you for the moment of zen…I just love watching hawks at work.
Wanderer
Benjamin Franklin had always thought the Wild Turkey should be the American bird. He was a man ahead of his times. I truly enjoy your posts Albatrossity. Thank you.
bluefoot
Corvids and raptors! Beautiful photos as always.
There was a young bald eagle hanging out near my house, but the crows chased it off.
arrieve
And now it’s officially Monday–excellent photos as always.
I had a red-tailed hawk on my fire escape yesterday morning, in Midtown Manhattan. I love that there are so many birds in the city that I get the occasional raptor right outside my window.
mvr
These are all great. I love the Harlan’s Hawk photos, even though I swear I’ll never get the hang of distinguishing most raptors in the wild. I’m somewhat reliable with eagles and harriers and maybe kestrels. Beyond those I am unreliable. But maybe a bit more reliable than before Albatrosity started the regular Monday posts.
Anyway, Thanks for these!
Mark von Wisco
The hawk in that last photo is especially striking!
Albatrossity
@mvr: Hawks, especially the many subspecies variations on the redtail theme, can be hard to ID in the field. I have found that most of the time I can do it if I have a good long look, but sometimes they don’t give you more than a flying-away rear end shot. That’s the beauty of digital photography. Even with that kind of view, if I shoot a burst of images and sort through them I can generally ID them at the subspecies level. Without the photos, however, it would be much more difficult!
whatsleft
Excellent photos ! Have you seen The Americas? The cinematography is breathtaking and the animal closeups are sublime. Includes Bald Eagle and Osprey in Ep 1.