Bird-eating Hawk
Photographer Phil Rowntree captured these images of a juvenile Cooper’s Hawk on a pole by the Virginia Street extension (left) and on a shrub in the southern section of the park (right).
The Cooper’s Hawk specializes in killing other birds. It likes them small and medium, with a preference for medium: pigeons, doves, robins, jays, even other raptors. They are a definite threat to Burrowing Owls, if they can get them.
The Cooper’s hunts by stealth, hiding high up in dense foliage and then diving onto the unsuspecting prey. It kills by squeezing the prey with its talons until it dies. It may hold the prey underwater until it drowns. Cooper’s also occasionally go after small mammals and reptiles.
Links: Audubon Cornell Wikipedia
