Mar. 27, 2018
J. Percy Priest Lake, Davidson Co. TN
This mid-morning on Anderson Rd. Rec. Area walking trail, I had a brief
hawk sighting.
Medium-size hawk in view over near tree line (~40 yds.) for a few seconds:
Even, unmarked light-medium gray underneath, belly and throat; sharply
squared tail, dark, no barring noticed; dark at the eye with smallish beak,
no pattern seen in wings, they seemed darker underneath than the belly, but
this could be factor of lighting; wing beats even, not 1-2-3, glide as for
accipiter, & no hint of reddish as for adult accipiter, but was about the
size of a larger Cooper's hawk.
Nothing else fits these field marks, that I can think
of, except Mississippi kite. A rare bird for middle-TN, but as I recall
MIKI has been seen in recent years fairly regularly, during migration,
around the Cumberland River area of Clarksville TN.
Richard Connors
Nashville
