Bird of the Month: Red-tailed Hawk
Adult Red-tailed Hawk. Photo by Jeff Bryant.
By Roger Digges, CCAS Vice-President
October’s bird of the month is the most frequently sighted hawk in Champaign County, indeed the most common of all the 28 birds of prey that live in North America all or part of the year. While Red-tailed Hawks are fairly plentiful in our area year-round, there are more of them from October through early March, as birds from Canada and the northern U.S. move south and join local residents.
Finding a Red-tailed Hawk can be as easy as driving down a country road or highway, and looking at fence posts, utility poles, and trees along the side of the road for perching hawks, which are either scanning the ground for rodents or other small mammals or waiting for a warm updraft. You may also see them riding that updraft in a wide circle as they expand their search. Unless you have a very large yard with a wide open space, Red-tailed Hawks will usually not visit your yard. But you can find them in local parks and forest preserves.
So how do you know it’s a Red-tailed Hawk? If the bird is in flight, even from distance you can see its broad wings held in a very shallow V shape as it circles high above. Closer in, when a mature red-tail banks with its back toward you, it clearly displays what All About Birds calls its “cinnamon-red” tail. If the hawk is overhead, the tail appears a pale pink. The red tail feathers don’t appear until the beginning of a bird’s second year, so a young red-tail shows you a brown tail with black bands. Perched red-tails facing you have a light breast with a dark belly band. Facing away from you they show the red tail, and a subtle white V across the “shoulders” and back. While local birders occasionally spot birds with different plumages, the vast majority of Red-tailed Hawks you’ll see in Champaign County have dark backs, light undersides with dark belly bands, and that iconic red tail (unless they’re still “teenagers,” in which case brown).
Red-tailed Hawks have become television and movie stars, often when they aren’t even on screen. Their hair-raising “keeeeeer!” call is so impressive that producers use it when showing other birds (particularly bald eagles, whose call is not impressive). I’ve heard the red-tailed call used for birds on other continents, and during one Star Trek episode, even on a far distant planet!
Like many birds of prey, Red-tailed Hawks have impressive courtship flights as they soar in wide circles far above you. Once at Meadowbrook Park I experienced the thrill of watching a courting pair drift closer, grasp talons, and spiral toward the ground before letting go. Following courtship, both male and female cooperate in building a nest near the top of a large tree; the nest can be up to 6 feet high and 3 feet wide. The female lays one to five eggs and both birds take turns incubating them. Young stay in the nest for about six weeks.
Unlike many birds, Red-tailed Hawks seem to be thriving. Between 1966 and 2019, their numbers have increased 1.3% annually. Today there are an estimated 3.1 million Red-tailed Hawks in North America.