Pied Beauty

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)

Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:

Praise him.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Birdwatching: Minor Challenges, Major Thrills

Red-Shouldered Hawk?
I believe this beauty is a Red-Shouldered Hawk.  I'm forever getting them confused with Red-Tailed Hawks and part of the problem is that birds are named after their least conspicuous marking!  I mean, really!  Wouldn't you call this one a Red-Chested Hawk?  It's also pretty difficult to see the shoulders of a hawk, if you want to know the truth.  I was lucky with this one.  Usually they are perched above my head or flying.
Red-Tailed Hawk?
 Here's the picture of what I think is a Red-Tailed Hawk, from an earlier blog entry.  You can't really see the tail in this picture, but I can promise you, it doesn't look red.  Not to me at least.  Maybe we could call this one the "White-Chested Hawk."  If the names were more descriptive, I could probably remember them better!

These are two of our most common hawks, so I'll have plenty more opportunities to practice!  Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

1 comment:

  1. Well, since you have so many gorgeous top preds, you should have a minimum of rats and snakes come spring.

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