Thanks everyone, five reponses so far - 4 votes for Collared Sparrowhawk
and 1 for Brown Goshawk.
1. Collared Sparrowhawk, but seems too small.
2. Collared Sparrowhawk on stance and tail shape but legs and toes seem
too robust.
3. Young Collared Sparrowhawk moulting from juvenile to adult plumage.
Tail looks like CSh.
4. Young CSh. Size looks right too.
5. Brown Goshawk. Toe nails look too short for CSh.
Some further information:
- Yesterday I measured the rail it's sitting on at 12cm, so scaling off
the photos the bird would be around 31cm. This puts it almost at the
lower limit for Collared Sparrowhawk and 6cm below that of Brown
Goshawk. So I guess even if the scaling is a bit wrong it still
excludes BG on size alone.
I saw what was likely the same bird fly over me in the same spot
yesterday afternoon. I'm not very good with fleeting glimpses of wing
shapes, but I would have said that the wings were "a little bit pointy",
and seemed to be fairly well straight out when gliding.
Could anyone please comment on the statement that "unlike the Brown
Goshawk the Sparrowhawk doesn't have an immature plumage stage"? Pizzey
shows immatures of both species looking fairly similar. Am I confused
about something here?
Also, is the brow in the photos of any value? The one BG I've seen
looked very fierce because of the brow, and the one CSh I've seen didn't
look fierce at all. The brow in these photos is a bit in between.
Peter Shute
wrote on Thursday, 21 February 2008
3:32 PM:
> Would anyone like to help identify this raptor? I'm thinking juvenile
> Collared Sparrowhawk or Brown Goshawk but not sure which.
>
> Here are some photos:
> m("N00/2281085306/","//www.flickr.com/photos/29752866");">http:
> m("N00/2280294871/","//www.flickr.com/photos/29752866");">http:
> m("N00/2280294777/","//www.flickr.com/photos/29752866");">http:
> m("N00/2280294659/","//www.flickr.com/photos/29752866");">http:
> m("N00/2280294503/","//www.flickr.com/photos/29752866");">http:
>
> Sorry the shots aren't that great, they're hand held at 430mm in dull
> light. I think the clearest is the second one.
>
> Immediately after I took these (beside Mt St Joseph pond in
> Altona) the bird appeared to swoop at a rabbit that ran across the
> path and under the fence was sitting on. Either that or the rabbit
> ran across and scared it off. It then flew away very low to the
> ground, not particularly fast.
>
> Peter Shute
> ==========www.birding-aus.org
> birding-aus.blogspot.com
>
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