Subject: broadwinged hawks
Date: Oct 3 09:26:58 1995
From: Don Baccus - donb at Rational.COM


Dan Victor sent me a recap of BWHK (Broad-winged Hawk) discussions on
tweeters which happened in my absence. A couple of comments...

>A flock of 75 BLACK-ROSY FINCHES were at the east rim viewpoint on Steens
>Mountain September 17. There were not there the day before or the day
>after. An early ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK and a probable BROAD-WINGED HAWK were
>among the hawks migrating past the viewpoint over the week-end.

All but one accepted record for BWHK in Oregon (that would be 4 of 5,
I think, I own one of them but forget how many there are) have been
in the Malheur/Steens/Catlow Valley area. Mostly spring birds, though.
I don't know if the Bonny Butte sightings by our Hawkwatch folk will
be submitted to the Oregon Records Committee for official consideration,
as the folks don't keep notes, aren't particularly on the look-out for
rare sightings, won't have photos or drawings, aren't part of the local
birding community, etc. They're seasonal employees from out of state.

>I can't answer the question, but I can say that for the past 5 consecutive
>years we have had confirmed sightings of Broad-wings over our Rocky Point and
>adjacent East Sooke Park hawkwatch sites at the s. tip of Vancouver Island --
>always in mid- Sept. to first week of Oct. These birds assemble here with
>Turkey Vultures, Red-tails, etc. and almost certainly cross Juan de Fuca
>Strait to the Olympic Peninsula of WA.

These dates correlate with our experience in the Goshutes. Anytime from
about the 10th to 20th of September gives an excellent chance of seeing
a broadwing there (we usually see a couple dozen). This year, however,
folks were stunned to capture an immy BWHK during the last week of
August. Other than this spaced-out early tripper, though, this year's
BWHK flight has fallen into the typical time-period. We never see them
mid-/late-October which is when we (conversely) get big red-tail and
eagle flights.

They are commonly found in flocks of 'tails, TVs, Swainson's - we rarely
get kettles over a dozen birds (we are a ridge site, after all) and they
try to sneak by in ones or twos in these smallish kettles. The ones
we capture (usually immies, only one adult captured to my knowledge)
are generally alone, along the ridge (like most buteos, if soaring
in a decent thermal they don't want to come down for food while moving
south) and head on look like, flap like, and are usually mistaken
for Cooper's hawks until they get quite close (hey!, that's a broad-winged!)

>We're glad to hear that Broad-winged hawks are being seen in WA.
>Broad-winged hawks do migrate down the coast. We used to live in the San
>Francisco Bay area for a short time and would watch hawks migrating over the
>Golden Gate. There were BW each year.

Golden Gate records about twice the number of BWHK each fall as we do
in the Goshutes, so I've been bugging friends in Oregon to keep an eye
out when in the Willamette Valley, Coast Range and the Cascades. They're
coming from Canada, moving south past San Francisco, so must be passing
over OR and WA, no?

So, keep your eyes open for "sawed-off red-tails". In groups of
'tails and TVs they're noticably smaller, they look pale, immies
aren't strongly marked. Flight feathers, particularly secondaries
and inner primaries, are long and when in the hand you can see that
they extend down the tail a fair distance, which leads to the name
and makes them look like they have short tails (adult red-tails can
look like they have mighty short tails in September, too, though,
as many are in the midst of molting their tails at this time).

When backlit, adults are very obvious, with a big white "flag" in
the tail (look at a guidbook illustration). Soaring birds from
late morning to mid-afternoon are generally backlit.

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <donb at rational.com>