Cooper's Hawk
Accipiter cooperii
Cooper's Hawks love the woods. They can fly at high speed maneuvering through branches to catch their prey. The female is notably larger than the male, as you can see in the top left photograph. Note their relatively flat, almost block-shaped heads (this contrasts with the rounder heads of the smaller but similar looking Sharp-Shinned Hawks). I had the good fortune one year to observe a breeding pair from conception all the way through the fledging and departure of the young from their nest area after they had learned to hunt. The photo on the top right shows the four chicks on the nest with the mother in the background. The father gathered most of the nest materials while it was being built, and the mother did more of its assembling. The mother did most of the incubating and tending of the chicks, while the father spent most of the day rounding up food to feed all of them--although they did switch positions sometimes to give the mother a break from the nest. If you'd like to see and hear more of this story, please see my album on my Flickr website. The bottom left photo here has a decent view of the Cooper Hawk's rounded tail, another helpful distinguishing characteristic from the squarer tail of the Sharp-Shinned Hawk. A final distinguishing characteristic that I'll mention is illustrated in the bottom right photo (and less so in the top left one): the black on the top of the head stops before going down the neck, so that it is a cap rather than the cowl of the Sharp-Shinned Hawk (Click on images to see enlarged versions.)