Nature!

[kelliem]

Last night as I was just getting ready to leave work, one of the faculty came in to tell me and my co-worker to come look out the window in his office, as a hawk had just caught a pigeon and was chowing down on it atop a kiosk out in the outdoor amphitheater my building surrounds. So we did, and it was. I ran back to my office and grabbed a camera and got a video and a few still shots. The quality isn't the best, I was fairly far away shooting through a dirty window, but I am still pretty amazed that this was taking place right outside my office!

After I got home I checked my birding books to ID the type of hawk, and I'm pretty sure it's a Cooper's Hawk though it could be a Sharp-Shinned, they look a lot alike. I think this is a Coopers because it doesn't have the rusty cheek-feathers that the Sharp-Shinned seem to have.

Warning! These shots may be a bit graphic for those of you who don't like to see things being eaten by other things.



There are larger versions of these at Flickr if you click on them.







And the video: