Ken,
I would say this is a brown goshawk. There are 3 ways to tell them apart, none of which are particularly easy and two of them aren't visible in this photo. The first is that a goshawk has a tail that is rounded at the end whereas a sparrowhawk's is square (i.e
straight across) at the end and typically has a little notch in the middle. The second is that sparrowhawks have legs that are much more slender than goshawks (and with a longer middle toe) and you can identify them on this alone with a bit of practice. The
third way is that goshawks have a brow ridge whereas sparrowhawks don't. This means that sparrowhawks "stare" while goshawks "frown". As this beautiful bird definitely looks like he's frowning at us, I'd be confident this bird is a Brown Goshawk. Very nice
photo!!
Cheers,
Mike
From: Ken Bissett
Sent: Tuesday, December 01, 2015 5:17 PM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] ID help please
is this a brown goshawk or collared sparrowhawk and how to tell the difference please.
thanks
Jill/Ken
