10/1, Central Park Falconry Show

Tawny Eagle

When you're having trouble spotting hawks, it helps when a falconry show comes to town.

Alerted by a note posted on Bruce's website, I headed over to Central Park Sunday afternoon to see the raptors on display. I was a bit late for most of the aerial exhibition, so don't know what all got to show their stuff, but I was there for all of the bald eagle flight.

I've put up 20 pix from the show on Flickr. The top shot here of the tawny eagle perhaps came out the best, although a couple of the kestrel, one of a Harris hawk, and a couple of the owls also came out very nicely.

There were some questions as to bird identification, but I didn't speak with any of the event staff to clarify what I was confused about then, much less now. One owl (at left above) had no identification sign. Meanwhile, the kestrel was indentified as "Eurasian kestrel", rather than as "common" or "lesser". Finally, there was one falcon (below left) about which I completely confused at this point; it was either next to a sign saying "lanner falcon" or else there was no sign at all. If it was a lanner falcon, then the plumage doesn't match any photos I've found on-line; perhaps it was a juvenile?

But at least the Harris hawk (below right) was obvious enough.

And hey, a red-tail. I recognize those.

Update on Oct. 6: Some belated clues suggest that the International Center for Birds of Prey switched sme raptors in and out during the program, but didn't necessarily change the signs to match. The bird at bottom left which was perched by a sign saying lanner falcon seems to instead have been a kite. The best matching photo I've found suggests it was a yellow-billed kite. Further, another photo match would suggest that the owl at middle left is a Ural owl.

And a very late update on Dec. 23: Someone looking at the photo posted on Flickr of the the kite indicated that it's a black rather than yellow-billed kite. A follow-up from someone else indicated that the two species are almost the same but it is indeed a black kite.

Further, I mentioned above about the birds being switched in and out. Turns out that they made one switch while I was there but which I completely missed. The pic at mid right above thatI called a kestrel is actually the lanner falcon. Although it's the same size bird, the picture above is quite different from those I took of the kestrel.