{"id":16522,"date":"2013-06-28T05:15:58","date_gmt":"2013-06-28T11:15:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=16522"},"modified":"2013-06-28T05:15:58","modified_gmt":"2013-06-28T11:15:58","slug":"red-tailed-hawks-creatures-of-habit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2013\/06\/28\/red-tailed-hawks-creatures-of-habit\/","title":{"rendered":"Red-tailed Hawks – Creatures Of Habit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last summer (these first two photos were taken July 22, 2012) I photographed this mated pair of Red-tailed Hawks in western Montana.\u00a0 On\u00a0most mornings and some evenings I could almost count on finding them perched in the same old snag and even on the same branch of the dead tree.<\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

The male is on the left and the somewhat larger\u00a0(sexual dimorphism)\u00a0female on the right.\u00a0 This pair seemed inseparable.\u00a0\u00a0When I saw one I nearly always saw them both, perched very close to each other.<\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

At times they couldn’t seem to get close enough<\/em> to each other.<\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

Earlier this month on my first Montana camping trip I found the same mated pair on the same perch (male at bottom, female up top).\u00a0 Sometime in the interim part of the branch that the female is perched on broke off (compare photo #1 to photo #3) so there’s no longer enough room there for both birds to perch comfortably.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

When the female gave me a long and lazy wing stretch I figured she was about ready to take off…<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

which she did.<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

Seconds later the male followed her.<\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

I was able to stay locked on to the male…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

as he left the tree behind and descended slightly so that some of the trees in the background became part of the\u00a0 frame.<\/p>\n

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\"red-tailed<\/a><\/p>\n

After this shot I began to lose focus.<\/p>\n

I’m intrigued by the mating patterns, pair behaviors and roosting habits\u00a0of these hawks.\u00a0 The species is known for using the “same roost site, and even\u00a0roost tree, for several nights to several weeks” (BNA) but this pair seems\u00a0almost addicted to this particular tree over the long haul.\u00a0 The land owner\u00a0told me that this pair has used that roost tree\u00a0“for years”.<\/p>\n

Non-migratory Red-tailed Hawks are usually monogamous and\u00a0maintain pair bonds until the death of a partner but there is “no information” on maintenance of pair bonds in migrants.\u00a0 In much of North America this species tends to be year-round residents (sedentary) but in the higher elevations of Montana they’re mostly migratory.\u00a0 In non-migratory\u00a0(sedentary) birds, mates remain together throughout the year but it is “unknown” if this is the case in migratory birds.\u00a0 \u00a0Range maps show that this pair is right on the border between migratory and sedentary but since this pair seems so loyal to each other over time I suspect that they may be non-migratory.<\/p>\n

I’m wondering if I’ll find this pair, perhaps in the same roost tree,\u00a0once again next summer.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

Note:\u00a0 I’ve used Birds of North America Online as a reference for this post.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last summer (these first two photos were taken July 22, 2012) I photographed this mated pair of Red-tailed Hawks in western Montana. On most mornings and some evenings I could almost count on finding them perched in the same old snag and even on the same branch of the dead tree.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month on my first Montana camping trip I found the same mated pair on the same perch (male at bottom, female up top). <\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16529,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[334,1493,391,450],"tags":[452,1539,1540,866,219,220,451,1541,276],"class_list":["post-16522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-birds","category-montana-favorite-locations","category-nesting-and-mating","category-red-tailed-hawks","tag-buteo-jamaicensis","tag-mated-pair","tag-mating-patterns","tag-migration","tag-monogamous","tag-montana-2","tag-red-tailed-hawk","tag-sedentary","tag-sexual-dimorphism"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/red-tailed-hawk-9669-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-4iu","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16522\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}