A Coopers Hawk Sitting In A Tree - Video

A rare visitor to my yard. He comes by to terrorize the little birds, who always see him coming and scatter. He never has much luck here.

It was snowing that day, but not very cold. Upper 20's. He sat there for at least a half hour and let me record him. He could easily see me through the window, as he was just 18 or 20 feet away from the camera.

http://youtu.be/h6fHgC​fS78Y

Very fortunate to have such a patient Coopers
In your yard. I have the odd one show up but they
are super skittish. Looks like a mature bird too
with those red eyes and they spook much quicker
than the juvies.

Wow Gary. Long time since we met, heh. Nice to see you again.

This bird has been coming here for at least 5 years now. I have pics of him as a juvie, sitting on the stove pipe of the shed. His eyes were yellow then. He never has much luck here, however, I have gone out to feed the birds in the morning and a few times have seen a splash of red Cardinal feathers in spots, and once, even some Blue Jay feathers.

The first part where the camera moved, I was putting it on the tripod, but later, when I aimed towards the top of the tree, I was trying to catch the little Chickadees, which ultimately did not show through the fogged glass, that were pestering him. They would get quite close, teasing him. They are fearless. LOL

it's a sharp shinned hawk, but still cool

I can never tell the 2 apart.
Cool experience though.

Just checked out your video....very cool (and saw Tom theperegrineflyer's keen-eyed ID).

Was that on a tripod?

The first part was hand held. The second part was a second movie, split by time enough to let me get the tripod out and set up and mount the camera. He was there for well over a half hour, and I won't be convinced this is not a Coopers Hawk of about 18 inches length. I also have a Sharp Shinned that comes by once in awhile, and it is much smaller than this. I've watched these two birds here for 5 or more years, and this is way to big for any description of a sharpy.

Nice video. What camera/lens?

It is an older Canon F10. Just a small hand held handicam sort of thing. Pretty nice and when new it cost $500 or so. I edited the video files with Premiere Pro CS5.

If you want to dabble with video on a small budget, I also have a Canon SX130 IS. They are fairly cheap, but do 1280x720 video that looks pretty good. They use two AA batteries that do not last very long, but I bought an AC adapter for like $9 on E-bay that works wonderfully. So around the house, it is great.

canonloader - Hope I didn't offend you on the ID of the bird, I'm sure I didn't by simply offering my insight but sometimes it can be taken the wrong way. So, thanks again for your video post and info on the tripod.

Sometimes I feel compelled to chime in about hawk ID's since I study raptor ID for a living, and people either expect it of me, wonder why I didn't respond, or are just curious of my thoughts. So I offer them just in case, hoping no-one is offended, its almost a catch 22 for me....I hope you understand. Anyway, I joined this site for the photos, so my thoughts on ID will stay private unless asked. That would work best.

LOL, no, I never take offense unless someone calls me a name. LOL I am just so sure that this has to be a Coopers Hawk, and I will admit, I am judging it just by size alone. I have seen many Sharpy's here and they are no bigger than a Blue Jay. This guy was as big as a medium sized crow, which having had a few crows as pets, I know something about. But I will still entertain dispute, since what else we got going now?

Very nice video work Mitch, I hope you've been well. Great to see you posting in bird town again.

When I saw your video I was unsure at first which raptor you had here, Sharp-shinned or Coopers. At the 2:09 point I decided Sharp-shinned. Your bird has a hooded appearance rather than a capped. The dark on the back of the neck indicates Sharp-shinned. As far as size goes, large female Sharp-shinned Hawks can be nearly as large as small male Cooper's Hawks. Size is variable among both species between the larger females and smaller males. Shame the bird didn't fan its tail for you, can't blame it though-looks mighty cold there.

Hey Steve. I have not been around for awhile, but I was posting in macro for a long time, with video and images from my microscope. Still doing a lot of that. Catching this guy was just a lucky find.

Mitch, just glad your not offended.....

Hello Mitch, real nice video, except for all that white stuff falling. I have had the local guy perch in a tree and hang out for a while, once it was almost all day, same perch most of the time. I could sit right there looking at him, he just stayed. Even the little peeps seemed to know he was not hunting that day, pretty good for a dumb old animal huh! Hope you warm up soon!