canberrabirds

Grey goshawk???

To: 'Matthew Larkin' <>, "" <>
Subject: Grey goshawk???
From: Philip Veerman <>
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2018 12:13:12 +0000
Hi Matthew,

At the start of the breeding season (such as now) ravens and many others
heighten aggression to others. So an interaction with cockatoos is feasible.
However so is presence of a (White morph) Grey Goshawk, they are known rare
visitors here. So it was probably that. Apart from the obviously much longer
tail that you mentioned and a rather different shape and no crest, the
goshawk has much longer, sturdy bright yellow legs than any cockatoo (not
short black legs). In flight they are of course different. I have once on
the NSW south coast seen a white morph Grey Goshawk perched beside the
highway and even though we were driving past at a fair speed, I picked it
for what it was easily, and was able to turn around and go back to have a
close look.

There is an idea that in the northern part of its range the grey morph uses
association with the grey Topknot Pigeons as a camouflage and maybe in the
south the white form uses association with cockatoos as a camouflage. Just
ideas but there is some basis to it.

Philip

-----Original Message-----
From: Matthew Larkin 
Sent: Tuesday, 21 August, 2018 5:21 PM
To: 
Subject: Grey goshawk???

Travelling west on William Hovell Drive, I noticed above me a pair of ravens
interacting with a white bird.  Is it a Sulphur Crested or a Corella? A bit
strange, I thought - why are the ravens giving the cockatoo a hard time?? As
we turned right onto Bindubi, I got a somewhat closer look, and noticed that
the white bird had a noticeably longer tail than either of the previous
suspects should have had. We drove on, leaving the commotion behind, but I
was left wondering what, other than a white morph Grey Goshawk, would have
that general appearance and be generating that response from the ravens??
Any thoughts?

Matthew
Sent from my iPad


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