Herb Segars Photography Blog

I believe that Veronica and I first saw this red-tailed hawk last summer. What really made us notice it was the way it continued to screech. It seemed like an immature hawk and it also seemed unusual for it to carry on a litany of constant screaming. I had a few opportunities over the next year to see the hawk but could never get close enough for any decent picture.

One of the things that did happen over the course of the year is that Veronica and I gave the hawk a nickname – Screech! Over the course of time, he lived up to his name but managed to stay far enough away from me that I couldn’t get a descent photo.

I did some Google research on red-tailed hawks so that I would know a little more about them.

They are considered a small-sized bird of prey but Screech seems to be pretty large to me. They are also colloquially known as “chickenhawk” although it rarely preys on chickens but at the Brick Reservoir, Screech has become known more as a “duck hawk” as he has been feeding on the resident mallard ducks.

Red-tailed hawks are found in central Alaska, the Yukon, and the Northwest Territories east to southern Quebec and the Maritime Provinces of Canada, and south to Florida, the West Indies and Central America. Its preferred habitat is mixed forest and field, with high bluffs or trees that may be used as perch sites.

When they fly, they flap their wings as little as possible to conserve energy. They can travel from 20 to 40 mph.

Red-tailed hawks are opportunistic feeders. Their diet is mainly small mammals but it also includes birds and reptiles. They reach sexual maturity at two years of age so I guess that Shriek is there as we have seen him (her) for over a year. They are monogamous birds and mate with the same individual for many years. They usually only take another mate when their original mate dies.

Every time that we have seen Screech, the bird has been alone so I guess that Screech is on the lookout for a mate.

My big breakthrough for Screech came a few weeks ago as Veronica and I walked around the reservoir and it happened almost in our back yard. Our back yard borders on the Brick Reservoir.

We moved into Brick in 1986 and our backyard was a sand pit. When the company that was mining the pit went out of business, there was talk about a number of different uses, most of which we did not want to see.

When the talk came around to a reservoir, we were thrilled. They have become great neighbors for us. We love living where we do.

As we approached our back yard from the reservoir, we noticed some people standing and looking at the woods. They weren’t sure what they were looking at. I heard comments like “it’s an osprey hawk” or “is that an owl?” Veronica and I knew that it was Screech and we informed anyone that stopped that it was a red-tailed hawk. He was on a tree branch about ten feet off the ground. I asked Veronica to walk to the house and get my camera while I kept an eye on Screech. When we first saw Screech, he was facing us and we could see the beautiful colors of his underside. By the time Veronica came out and handed me the camera over the back yard fence, Screech had turned his back on us but was kind enough to keep looking to see what we were up to. I managed to get off a few photos before he flew to the ground to partake in something that we could not see because of the dense underbrush. One of the men that work at the reservoir told me about Screech landing on a wooden fence that is between the walking path and the water. A woman walked right past the hawk and it didn’t move. How cool is that?

I did a lot of my research on Wikipedia.org. They are a storehouse of information. If you would like to see more photos of red-tailed hawks, including a few that my son, Tom, took years ago, you can visit my Photo Gallery or go direct to Red-tailed hawk photos by clicking here. I have to say that I am really jealous of Tom’s red-tailed hawk photos. He used a Canon point-and-shoot camera and crawled on his stomach and got very close to the hawk. This is that photo.