Howdy Tweeters,

I've been lurking for a while and enjoying your posts.
I am inspired to write to you today because I'm having trouble identifying an unexpected visiter to my backyard feeder.
I am an amateur birder at best, so what may be elusive to me may be totally obvious to you. I hope so.

My visitor, or perhaps visitors, have not come to dine on the seeds, but on the plump and friendly sparrows who eat the seeds. The first time I saw it/them, I was upstairs late one afternoon, and I heard a great commotion at the feeder. As I looked out the window, all the little sparrows were flying away, and one poor unfortunate lay on the ground, struggling. I was about to run down to see if it needed to be taken to an animal rehab. center when a huge bird landed on top of it, looked left and then right, and then flew away with it. I could see that the large bird had toffee colored leg feathers and a white line above each eye. From above, it's tail looked squarish and a little stubby. Otherwise, it was all dark brown and about three times the size of a NW crow.

The second time, just this morning, I heard a very loud screech. From out of the backyard there arose such a clatter that I ran to the back door to see what was the matter. The screech was shorter and lower in pitch than a red tail, lasting only milliseconds longer than a crow's call. I arrived to find a very dark bird, about the same size as the first, sitting on fence, seemingly plotting it's next move. The tail looked longer this time, but still squarish. It was dark all over, except for a spotted chest and perhaps a darker eyeline. The shadows in my yard can sometimes play tricks with the eyes, so it's hard to be sure about the eyeline.

As for the environment, I live a little less than a tenth of a mile from the shore of Lk. WA in a neighborhood that provides many levels of cover, including very mature trees, fruit trees, shrubs, and ivy.

So, between the few moments it took me to recover from the shock and my visitors' hasty retreat, I was unable to gather any further information. I couldn't find anything in my field guides that looked quite right. I thought maybe it was a male, female, or immature Cooper's Hawk, but I'm notoriously bad at identification, so I thought I would appeal to the more experienced among you. If you have any ideas as to what it/they might have been, I'd love to hear it.

Thanks.
Joanne