Hello Tweets,

Yesterday, the 18th, a friend and I were walking out at the Nisqually Delta
enjoying the beautiful weather and all our feathered friends when we came
across something that left us scratching our heads.
We had commented several times the oddity of not seeing any birds of pray,
so when we were heading back towards the visitor center from McAllister
Creek we were happily surprised to see a hawk perched on the ground maybe 12
feet in front of us, on the very edge of the rock path. It was facing west
as if admiring the view. This seemed a very strange behavior but we didn't
mind getting really good views of this bird, which was a *Rough-legged Hawk*.
That in itself is a nice treat, especially at the delta. But it's behaviour
was really puzzling us. We then saw movement a few feet away to the east of
this bird where another bird of pray was having an early dinner of coot
breast. This hawk did not look anything like a rough-legged and indeed
looked identical to a *Cooper's Hawk*. The behaviour seemed like that of a
pair of birds who might take turns eating, while the other stands watch.
But these were too different species all together. So, not knowing a lot
about this kind of behaviour I am curious if anyone could shed some light on
this. Has anyone else ever seen a larger hawk, sit patiently with it's back
to a smaller hawk having dinner? There were some people that came up behind
us and we finally let them pass, it took them getting very close to the
birds before the rough-wing took flight, and then finally the Cooper's took
off as well.

Maurie Kirschner
Olympia, WA
mnmkirschner at gmail.com