***!!!(((Great Black Hawk)))!!!***

[jpak]

Checked it off this afternoon.

This is a South American bird.

First sighting ever in North America

It was located at Deering Oaks Park in downtown Portland, Maine.

BIG crowds of birders with many flying in from as far away as California and North Carolina.

Some had the biggest telephoto lenses I have ever seen - Cannon-sized Canons almost 4 feet long and a foot wide.

The bird put on quite a show.

First sunbathing in a large fir tree in full sunlight.

Then it dropped to the ground and stalked about on its long bright yellow legs - it looked like a Secretary Bird.

It disappeared behind a tree and then flew off a short distance with a pigeon it has killed - and commenced to chow down on it.

It's winter here - how will it survive?

[Glorfindel]

1. Poor thing. It will freeze! The hawks have long since left my location in north Georgia

in the southern Appalachians. I don't know where they go, but we have a pair of huge red-shouldered hawks and a couple of chicken hawks whose territories overlap. They pretty much ignore each other. After different prey, I suppose.

[pandr32]

2. Where's a picture?

[jpak]

3. Here ya go

[brokephibroke]

5. At first I thought it was a dark morph of a ferruginous

But,upon further review, no yellow on the face...

[pandr32]

7. Wow!

Both the entwined, gnarly branches and the coordinated markings on the hawk make quite a picture.
Mahalo!

[RainCaster]

4. Beautiful bird, but a long way from home

I wonder if he was a pet that got loose from a falconer. No leathers on his legs?

[jpak]

6. It was spotted on Padre Island TX earlier this year

Exact same plumage - so it's probably a vagrant.

It seems to be VERY successful at hunting - I feel bad for the park squirrels.