I listened to all the raptor sounds I found on that site (thank you!) Am poking around on youtube and googling as well. Just remembered that a neighbor knows birds well. I hope she can help me.

It might have been just a duck.

Ah, ya made me laugh. I did not consider that if it quacks like a duck..... ;)

But the silhouette looked like a hawk to me.

"Around sunset" were your key words- you were likely hearing the sound of a Common Nighthawk. They are not a hawk, per se, but they do have long angled wings. They fly erratically, almost bat-like. They forage on insects at dusk and dawn. They have bold white stripes toward their outer wings. They migrate out for winter.

Thanks for that info, tmff. I haven't heard this bird sound since that one evening in July, but being in the garden as much as I am, perhaps I will hear it again one day.

I call the screaming hawk sound the "TV eagle sound." lol Coopers Hawks sound a little like pileated woodpecker calls, only louder and slower, and sometimes they will make a single-note call with that same sound. Youtube has great videos for hawk calls. :) I love to hear ours.

I just saw what I thought were our 2 neighborhood hawks. Until I heard them quack quack. Flying in circles high above. Then I decided to Google it and found this post.

In Tucson, the Cooper’s Hawk makes that duck-like sound.