A Hawk and a Life Lesson on a Sunday Morning

At about  9am, I was walking back to my apartment with Yoshi, whom I had just taken out for his morning walk.  Another clear-blue sky hot late August day was in the works. Yoshi trotted happily ahead as I walked hanging on to his leash on the sidewalk that leads from the Rose Courtyard of the apartment complex to our apartment when I, absent- mindedly, heard a whoosh not far over my head that sounded like canvas flapping tightly in the wind. Maybe, the sound was magnified because the 2 buildings on either side of me blocked it to some extent and caused an echo very close to my ear. I don't know. I also felt a swoosh of air. I could feel some intriguing energy in it made me turn so I did.  Maybe, somebody or something had zapped ferociously colliding atoms into the wind such that ordInary humans such as myself could perceive them. Either way, I turned 180 degrees to face North and the courtyard. I suppose Yoshi turned too. He probably had to because he was on his leash. The snapping canvas sound was, I now realized because I had eyeballs on it, a hawk chasing down a pigeon in mid-flight/dive. There were, actually, several pigeons in the tableau that was unfolding about 20 feet in front of me. Maybe, pigeon strategy is such that a group of them can, somehow, work together to deter a hawk. They were not successful and the hawk grabbed one of the pigeons. However, at the same time that that the hawk skewered the pigeon with it's talons, I had processed what I was watching enough to be seriously freaked out. I screamed and yelled "OMG". Curiously, none of my neighbors came out to check on a screaming woman. I felt I screamed loudly.  As I screamed and yelled my internet acronym, I saw the hawk either let go of the pigeon because it was startled by a screaming woman or lose a tenuous grip on the pigeon. The pigeon made it's lucky escape off to the right behind the flowering rose bushes. I didn't see it fly away but it must have because I went to look for it to see if it was on the ground injured by the hawks talons and it was not there. I don't remember the hawk flying away but it must have because it, too, was gone either back up to the sky from whence it came or, probably, to another nearby perch from where it could continue to sit and watch and wait for another chance at another pigeon. Even now, two weeks plus down the road, I can still see, quite clearly, the underside of the hawk's tail as it dove. I was sure it had been a Red-Tailed Hawk. The underside of the tail was a cream color with brown, horizontal stripes. My research indicated that meant it was, most likely, a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk because they have stripes like that on their tails. Red-tailed Hawks don't have red tails until they are about 2 years old. Also, I have seen either one or more Red-tailed Hawks in a nearby park when I have been on walks. That Hawk fit with my own personal experience of this area as I have seen several Hawks of the Red-tailed variety.

     However, after consultation with my brother, who is a Wildlife Biologist, I believe, this time, I saw a Cooper's Hawk and the horizontal tail stripes were wider but I saw them so quickly they seemed more narrow than they actually were. A Red-tailed Hawk is too big of a bird to fly effortlessly between 2 buildings that are as close together as those two buildings that Yoshi and I were between. They are not built for speed and maneuverability in tight spaces. Coopers Hawks are. Ever since, I look up when I go outside my apartment building to see if I spot a Coopers' Hawk perched nearby. I have not seen one which reinforces my theory that you can never really be prepared for hawks that show up in your everyday life. I'll tell you what. They show up when they are ready and they get your adrenaline going and you realize there are beautiful birds of prey out there waiting to swoop down and in and grab a pigeon.