First Hawk of the 2010 Fall Season

I won't argue with you about when fall actually starts.  In fact I'll even concede that it's still summer.  That's nothing but calendar stuff just like daylight saving time... smoke.  The real indicator of fall is when the summer temperatures start to fade from our memories, the trees and plants start to cycle down and when the hawks start dropping by in an effort to reduce the bird population.

We had our first (observed) hawk earlier this week, Tuesday I believe, around noon.  S/he was a beauty and luckily I got a few pictures of this majestic creature before Alejandro F. started filling the pond scaring the hawk away.

Here are three of the pictures I was lucky enough to get.  Not bad are they.

So what kind of hawk is this?  I don't know for sure.  My first thought was a "sharp-shinned hawk" but I read in my Peterson Field Guide that they have red eyes.  As you can clearly see, this beauty has the nicest blue eyes.  I like the color.

We, Ginger and I, figured it was either a Cooper's Hawk or a Harrier Hawk, and definitely a juvenile.  A query to a friend in Denver who queried a friend in Denver report they think it is a Juvenile Cooper's Hawk.  So that's the story and I'm stick'n with it.

Whoohoo.