Author: Sharon Swaney

Short-eared Owl
Photo by Matt Valencic

Searching for winter raptors is done from the comfort of your car. Just drive around appropriate habitats, find safe places to stop, then start looking! Some raptors are year-round residents, like Red-tailed, Red-shouldered and Cooper’s Hawks. Others, like Northern Harrier’s, Rough-legged Hawks and Short-eared Owls,...

Red-tailed Hawk
Photo by Matt Valencic

Searching for winter raptors is done from the comfort of your car. Just drive around appropriate habitats, find safe places to stop, then start looking! Some raptors are year-round residents, like Red-tailed, Red-shouldered and Cooper’s Hawks. Others, like Northern Harrier’s, Rough-legged Hawks and Short-eared Owls,...

American Kestrel
Photo by Matt Valencic

Searching for winter raptors is done from the comfort of your car. Just drive around appropriate habitats, find safe places to stop, then start looking! Some raptors are year-round residents, like Red-tailed, Red-shouldered and Cooper’s Hawks. Others, like Northern Harrier’s, Rough-legged Hawks and Short-eared Owls,...

Northern Harrier
Photo by Matt Valencic

Searching for winter raptors is done from the comfort of your car. Just drive around appropriate habitats, find safe places to stop, then start looking! Some raptors are year-round residents, like Red-tailed, Red-shouldered and Cooper’s Hawks. Others, like Northern Harrier’s, Rough-legged Hawks and Short-eared Owls,...

Rough-legged Hawk
Photo by Matt Valencic

Searching for winter raptors is done from the comfort of your car. Just drive around appropriate habitats, find safe places to stop, then start looking! Some raptors are year-round residents, like Red-tailed, Red-shouldered and Cooper’s Hawks. Others, like Northern Harrier’s, Rough-legged Hawks and Short-eared Owls,...

Bufflehead (female)
Photo by Matt Valencic

  Buffleheads eat a variety of aquatic invertebrates (insect larvae), crustaceans and mollusks. She builds her nest in an old Flicker hole in the boreal forests for Canada and Alaska. 

Ring-necked Duck (female)
Photo by Matt Valencic

  Ring-necked Ducks dive underwater to eat a variety of plant and animal materials.  They breed in freshwater marshes and bogs across the boreal forest of North America. Young are independent at 2-days of age.  

Redhead (female)
Photo by Matt Valencic

   Redheads eat a variety of submerged aquatic plants and some animal material.  The female is notorious for laying her eggs in the nest of other duck species, a behavior called ‘brood parisitism’.

Canvasback (female)
Photo by Matt Valencic

  This diving duck eats plant tubers at the bottom of lakes and wetlands.  She builds her nest on floating mats of vegetation and will sometimes put her eggs in the nest of another duck.