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Posted by Brian Rapoza on 17:43:33 04/01/12
In Reply to: Re: Lucky Hammock Hawk ID posted by Toe
After I let Rick Taylor know of Toe's April Fool's joke, Rick replied with the following (printed with his permission):
"I still think it's a Short-tailed. It's not a Zone-tailed. Imm. Z-T has so many tail bands its tail often appears whitish. While Zonies are bigger than Short-tails, neither comes close to approaching a Turkey Vulture in size. Excluding eagles, no N. American raptor does. Therefore the observer must not have had a good idea of the relative size of the birds involved in the observation. The prima facie evidence of relatively short tail, relatively thick, black tail-bands, medium-width and length wings, bulging secondary wing shape (Z-Ts have a very straight trailing edge to the remiges with no obvious division between primaries and secondaries when soaring), pale-based primary pattern, lack of evenly-banded flight feathers over entire underwing, and relative head size clearly eliminates Z-T Hawk as a possibility."
By the way, according to the range maps in Steve Hilty's "A Guide to the Birds of Columbia," neither Short-tailed nor Zone-tailed Hawk should be expected in the Cartagena area!
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