Early this morning the sun was bright (finally) and glinted off the Common Grackles at the feeders. Lots of grackles now. I may not have glamorous birds but they certainly are shiny. The top grackle looked like it thought it was King of the World. For all I know, maybe it is. The grackles on the ground were shiny too. I like to have the grackles here because they eat defoliating caterpillars (other birds do too) - flying pesticides. ----------------------------------------------------- I've been having an argument with a chickadee, or maybe several chickadees. Their "dee-dee-dee" call supposedly warns against predators, with the number of "dee's" corresponding to the level of danger. Yesterday and today I heard a "dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee" call when I went out to fill the feeders. I find this enormously insulting since I'm feeding the little brutes, so I'm trying to call back a short "dee-dee" every time I hear the long "dee" call. It seems to be working, or maybe they're just amused, because the string of "dees" is getting shorter. Claire (who really needs some spring)

Thanks BN. That's what I thought as well, but I am not good at identifying raptors.

Hi Claire, Found this old thread; thought I'd rehash the past. Ha! I can't help myself. I'm a hawk watcher. Your opening photos were undoubtedly an accipiter. The grey/black banded tail is the dead giveaway. The length of it is more pronounced than that of any buteo. The wing tips of a Red-shouldered Hawk come just about to the tip of the tail when perched. A Red-shouldered would never have grey/black as its tail colors and wouldn't have such a distinction between tip of wing to tip of tail. Also, notice how widely spaced the banding on the tail is; a RSHA juvenile would have narrowly-spaced light brown/dark brown banding on a much shorter, tapered tail. Juv RSHA would have heart-shaped streaking on chest down to the belly. Since you have familiarity with the small size of Sharpies and believed this to be too large, I'd day you had a juvenile Cooper's hawk here. Also, Blue Jays frequently imitate Red-shouldereds to freak out feeding birds and lay claim to what they leave behind. Tricksy birds, they are. Perhaps you've heard them do that. But you may have heard a RSHA in your woods as they seem to cling to the east coast year-round rather than fully migrate out. This post was edited by TMFF on Thu, Feb 7, 13 at 17:31

I just looked at some pages that I copied from a book about hawks and saw that the Northern Harrier has a large white band at the base of its tail on its back. Could that be what it is? I didn't see this band on the drawings of a red-tailed. Tammy