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National Audubon Releases “State of the Birds” SCAS Welcomes Spence Guerin to our December 10 General Meeting Florida’s Bald Eagles vs. Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne Bird Identification Tips from the Very Bad Birder Satellite Beach Recreation Department Upcoming Events Banded Cooper’s Hawk Completes Five Year Odyssey |
Banded Cooper’s Hawk Completes Five Year OdysseyReprinted from Audubon NewswireOn October 7, 2004, Jon Stravers and David Kester of Audubon’s Upper Mississippi River Campaign captured an adult female Cooper’s Hawk at their raptor banding station near Effigy Mounds National Monument on the Mississippi River. The hawk had been previously banded as a second year bird on October 14, 2000 near the town of Jalapa in Veracruz, Mexico. The distance between these two banding stations is approximately 1750 miles. This is an amazing journey. Mortality rates of most raptors are significant during the first year—as much as 70%. Likely born in 1999, this is a bird that has survived five migrations to the tropics and back. This story has an interesting personal note in that Ernesto Ruelas, director of Pronatura, a conservation organization in eastern Mexico, banded this particular Cooper’s Hawk in 2000. Ruelas first came to the U.S. in 1989 and worked with Jon Stravers in the Goshute Mountains of Nevada at a raptor banding station operated by Hawkwatch International. For more information, contact Jon Stavers at hawk2@alpinecom.net. |