[Birdtalk] A tale of two hawks

[Dave Hanscom]

Thanks for your comments, Tim.  And for your detailed descriptions of why
you decided the bird wasn't what you first thought it was.

For those of us not very experienced at birding, it can be a matter of 
which "expert" to believe/trust.  I'm reminded of the debate over whether 
the bird seen at Farmington Bay last year was a Parasitic or a Pomerine 
Jaeger.  I decided which bird to put on my list based on whose judgement I 
had the most faith in.  I certainly didn't feel that my knowledge was good 
enough to come up with an independent choice.

These debates are really great, and make all of us better birders!

Dave Hanscom

On Tue, 4 Mar 2008, Tim Avery wrote:

> Thanks to everyone who has responded publicly and privately on this 
> bird.
> 
> I can honestly say that when I saw the bird the first time I simply 
> looked at it, said Red-shouldered and that was that.  I didn't bother to 
> look closely, at the bird, as in the evening light it looked 
> superficially like a RSHA.  Call it being purely lazy.  Or call it 
> sloppy birding, either way I would like to apologize for not taking a 
> closer look at the bird when I first went to see it. I will take a 
> different road than others and would venture that there is no 
> Red-shouldered Hawk hanging out in Farmington, but an odd Red-tailed 
> (one with a pattern very much like a Red-shouldered), that has fooled 
> everyone who went to look for it.
> 
> The fact that no one caught on earlier brings up a phenomenon that I 
> think a lot of us get caught up in.  A bird is reported, we go to look 
> for it, and see it!  And often we don't take the time to look at the 
> bird, study its field marks closely.  And making it even more difficult 
> is when the report comes from experienced observers.
> 
> In this case after the initial time seeing it, I saw it three more times 
> and never once took to actually looking at the bird. Truly what I would 
> call a humbling experience, and showing that just because it looks like 
> something, and maybe even acts like something, it can still be something 
> else.  Doesn't matter how many Red-tailed Hawks I have seen, or how few 
> Red-shouldered, not taking the time to work out the ID based off every 
> detail of the bird was jsut lazy on my part! Looks like its back to the 
> books!
> 
> Good Birding
> 
> Tim