The only thing with Crossley's Raptor guide is that, for relative beginners, it's photograph overload. Turn to any particular page and one could quickly feel overwhelmed by intricate plumage differences that ultimately jumble together to form one big complex hawk in your memory. Kind of like a library without a card catalog. There's very little you can do other than commit some field marks, flight styles, and behavior to memory. Or, just get good pictures and ask me. :-) Although there are times I have trouble IDing a hawk myself. Depends on how good of a look I can get. I think what else may be helpful is to always know what you might be likely to see in your area. In CT, your Red-taileds are going to be easterns. They pretty much all look the same. You probably have many year-round Red-tailed residents and the guy you photographed up there probably has a mate on a nest right now. A nesting (adult) pair of Red-taileds have the rufous tails. A juvenile (last year's brood) bird will lack a rufous tail and will show brown and white tail bands instead. A clean, lightly marked underside is more indicative of an adult- juvies have more brown markings and look streaky underneath. Some adults are heavily marked too though! Adult Red-taileds will also show a thin dark rim around the back of the underwing. You can see that on the bird you photographed. I recommend Dunne/Sibley/Sutton 'Hawks in Flight, 2nd Edition'. I have to say that I bought the Crossley guide for pleasure rather than purpose. I love the photos! But when I first sat down with it, I could already score very high on the "quizzes" he embedded within it. So, I learned my skills elsewhere. Hawks in Flight was a huge help with that.

They are beautiful in flight, aren't they?

I'd say you are correct with Broad-winged Hawk. -O-

Update on the two fledlings. They are doing well and pretty grown up. Parents are gone. They are still around my yard and get pretty excited when I mow the lawn. They usually find something that I disturb in the grass for them to eat. I decided to have some fun yesterday (too much time on my hands I guess) with them to get a closer look. I put a red hot dog on the lawn attached with fishing line far out in the back. No hooks by the way. I kept twitching it across the grass while they were perched above. You guessed it, one of them from high above dove down onto it where I could see it up close. He only ate a little of the dog though then took off. I did it again and the other one dove at it again. This hawk kept picking at the fishing line but didn't stay too long. I didn't have the camera handy, but what a sight to see it fold up its wings from high above to attack it. Oh, by the way, when I was about 12 yrs old,61 now, I used to have five of these Broad winged hawks as pets. I wish I could find the pic that was taken of me with one sitting on my shoulder. Thats it for now.