Jim and I birded both branches of 661 in Loudon county yesterday, and we were
in hawk heaven! Just after turning onto Montressor ( 661 west of US15 ), we
spotted a perched buteo in a tree on the left side of the road. Before Jim
could get the scope on it, I saw two hunting hawks in the field on the right.
One went down, and we tried to zero in on it but were distracted by another
perched buteo. This turned out to be our first-ever sighting of a rough-legged
hawk!! We were so excited that we barely managed to scope out the hunters, a
pair of northern harriers.
Meanwhile, back on the left side of the road, the perched buteo flew and lit
again in a closer tree. We scoped him: a red-tailed.
We returned to the car after an extended watch and had only driven a few feet
when we spotted a large buteo sitting on a fence post not more than fifty feet
from the road. Jim whipped the car into a pull-off, and we watched the
immature red-tailed for a good two minutes before he flew.
By this time we were quite drunk on hawk sightings but thirsty for more. We
continued our drive and saw two more rough legged, several red-taileds and
numerous harriers. In one meadow, we saw a family of three harriers on the
ground with a kill. The juvenile stayed on the ground for a few minutes while
we watched. Beautiful!
Go if you can. It's quite an experience.
Jim and Beth Creamer
You are subscribed to VA-BIRD. To post to this mailing list, simply send email
to va-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx. To unsubscribe, send email to
va-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field.
