March 2025 Raptor rapture: peregrine falcon, bald eagles, red-tailed hawks owls and more owls

Saturday March 1 Morning light at the pond.

My neighbor, David, mentioned that he's been hearing red-winged blackbirds over at the Arb, so I went over this afternoon to check it out. I think of them as one of the first birds to return after migration - exciting after a long, cold, exceptionally windy February. Lots of males around the marsh, some perched high up in trees, sounding off with their loud, buzzy trills. Wanting to see them closer up, I walked along the top of the concrete conduit that runs through the middle of the marsh. At one point, as I looked down, I spotted several owl pellets - indigestible bits of fur, bone and teeth from their food that they compact together and regurgitate, often from a regular roosting spot. I saw six within a couple of square feet.

 

Sunday March 2 Walking past Mary and David's house, I noticed their witch hazel has started to bloom, another sign of spring.

Later on this afternoon, stopping at Leverett Pond, which is almost entirely free of ice now, I watched a mute swan fly in and appear to hang in the air for a second or two before landing on the water near to another swan. They paired up facing of each other, simultaneously extended their necks and started to make a chattering sound with their bills. Maybe the beginning of courting? Hooded mergansers, common mergansers and a single male wood duck also swimming around.

Monday March 3  On my way into a meeting at Mass. Audubon's headquarters in Lincoln I spotted a pair of Eastern bluebirds checking out one of the nesting boxes: the female is on top of the box, the male, with its electric blue back gleaming in the sunshine, is inspecting the entrance hole. Bluebirds overwinter in this area; it looks like their thoughts are now turning to spring.

Tuesday March 4 Drove down to the Rhode Island shore for a day of birding. First stop, Point Judith, a little point that juts out into the ocean: saw a single red-breasted merganser close to the shore as well as a few horned grebes further out (the grebes are just a boring white and grey in the winter, but check out the link for their fancy colorful breeding plumage). Mild day, but the wind was cold and blustery at the point. Went on to the harbor at nearby Galilee, where the Block Island ferry docks. Lots of common eiders resting on the rocks in the harbor and a few red-breasted mergansers and common loons diving.

Then on to the Trustom Pond National Wildlife Refuge where I met up with my friend, Di, who lives nearby. At the feeder by the parking lot the usual back yard birds: dark-eyed juncos, tufted titmice, black-capped chickadees, blue jays, cardinals, white-throated sparrows and a downy woodpecker. The pond is separated from the ocean by a barrier beach and dunes and is a favorite stopover for migrating ducks. Today, there were hundreds of ducks in a few big rafts bobbing about (on the water, flocks are called rafts for some reason).  We got great views of lots of ring-necked ducks, red-breasted mergansers, wigeon, redheads, canvasbacks, ruddy ducks, common goldeneye and blue-winged teal. 

In the midst of all the ducks was a single tundra swan, an unusual bird for this area, even during migration.  The Cornell All About Birds website says that Meriwether Lewis, of Lewis and Clark fame, called them whistling swans, because of the whistling sound of their calls. Meriwether Lewis is also known in the bird world for Lewis's woodpecker, which he saw (and collected) on the expedition in 1806. Amazingly, Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology has one of the specimens he collected; you can see a photo and Lewis' description here. And, to be fair, a couple of days later he describes Clark's nutcracker, named for William Clark.)

(In my excitement to see the birds, I forgot to take any photos - oops.)

Friday March 7 This morning on my way to the pond I spotted snowdrops blooming in a neighbor's yard.

Went to the Standing Up For Science protest on Boston Common at the State House this afternoon, one of many protests in cities across the country. 

 

Lots of MIT people there, from students to lab managers to faculty and the Dean of Science. Some of my favorite signs:

 And this one, which pretty much sums up the situation

Saturday, March 8 Saw a peregrine falcon on the ice at the pond this morning, ripping a dead bird apart, feathers flying off the carcass. This is the second time this winter I've seen one eating a dead bird on the ice. I suspect the falcon killed the birds, as I haven't seen any dead birds on the ice otherwise.

The Cornell All About Birds website notes that peregrines prey on a remarkable range of birds: 450 of the 700 species in North America, from tiny hummingbirds (weighing a few tenths of an ounce) to sandhill cranes (weighing up to 11 pounds). The peregrines themselves typically weigh 2-3 pounds. You wouldn't think it was worth their while going after a hummingbird.  Mostly, they go after shorebirds, ducks, grebes, gulls, pigeons and songbirds. Bats, too. And they steal fish and rodents from other raptors.

A little while later, saw a muskrat swimming along the shoreline - look beyond the Canada goose and at the head of the wake in the video. 

Tuesday March 11 After yesterday's warm sunny day, the pond is continuing to melt around the edges. At the south end of the pond, I spotted a pair of wood ducks and a pair of hooded mergansers in the water. Another pair of wood ducks was perched in a tree, possibly getting ready for mating and nesting, near where a pair nested in a tree hollow last spring. Ducks look so weird perching in trees. 

The day after the ducklings hatch, they leap out of the nest, sometimes as high as 60 feet up in a tree, to join their mother, calling for them from below. Here's a great PBS Nature clip of a wood duckling making the leap. 

At the other end of the pond, 14 common mergansers, mostly males, their white bodies gleaming in the sun, swimming along at the edge of the ice. Another pair of hoodies and a single wood duck. I suspect the mergansers will be migrating further north before too long.

Further along the path, I saw what I thought was an immature bald eagle - huge, much bigger than a red-tailed hawk, dark chocolate brown on its back and wings, perched high up in a tree next to the water. 

After breakfast, I went to the Arboretum to visit the spot where Jeannie and I got married in 2004. Today is the fifth anniversary of her death - I can hardly believe she's been gone that long. I was so lucky to have had Jeannie in my life. Here's the little stream, Bussey Brook, next to our spot.

 

In the afternoon, I went to Broadmoor in Natick - the ponds there are nearly ice-free now. More hoodies paddling along at the edge of the marsh. Canada geese pairing up. A turtle sunning itself on a rock poking out of the water. Positively balmy - 64F (18C)!

Wednesday March 12  I ran into my pond friend, Linda, who got a photo of the possible eagle yesterday. Linda, Andrea and Jon all saw it yesterday and all said it was "huge".

Linda Weiner

Consulting Cornell's All About Birds, I saw a photo that looked a lot like this one and found this description of second year juveniles: "mostly white belly with some brown mottling, a brown chest and a broad brown mask on the face" also "the amount of white feathering can be highly variable on juvenile and second year birds". And Bob's your uncle - a second year bald eagle.

With the warmer weather, the pond is more open and more common mergansers have returned.

Driving along Memorial Drive on my way to MIT this afternoon, the ice on the Charles River was completely gone and the rowing eights were already out on the water.

Thursday March 13 Driving along Pond Street towards Brookline this morning, at the top of the hill, a red-tailed hawk flew fast over the roadway with a wriggling squirrel dangling from its talons. 

Went to Mass Audubon's Drumlin Farm sanctuary to look for woodcocks. They're weird looking birds - plump, their heads tacked onto their bodies with hardly any neck and long pointy bills - check out the link for photos. From late February to early April the males do a spectacular courtship display at dusk, often in a meadow. They first make an electric buzzing noise that birders refer to as a "peent", then fly up to a height of up to 300' and spiral almost vertically down to the ground, making a twittering noise as they drop. We heard several making the buzzing noise, one of them quite close by, and saw one speed past overhead across the path in a millisecond, but didn't see any do the display. The Audubon naturalist who led the walk explained that woodcocks are "upland shorebirds" which sounds like an oxymoron to me. They don't live at the shore (they're upland) but are closely related to shorebirds.

On our way to the meadow, we did see a red-tailed hawk fly by with a squirrel in its talons; it landed in one tree, then flew off to another where it landed and started ripping at the squirrel. Pretty amazing that I saw two hawks with squirrels in one day. Maybe the squirrels are a bit less wary in the spring.

Saturday March 15  On my morning walk at the pond, a red-tailed hawk swooped down right in front of me, pounced at something on the hillside, flapped its wings for a bit then flew up to land, empty-handed (or empty-taloned?) on a branch practically in front of me. I hadn't appreciated how camouflaged the red-tails are amongst fallen leaves. Right by the spot where the hawk had pounced, a squirrel zipped away, surviving a close call.

Went to another live owl drawing class at Mass Audubon. My drawings still need more work but here are a couple of photos of the owls posing in front of the instructor's drawing.

Great horned owl

 

Screech owl

Sunday March 16 Walking along Centre St in Jamaica Plain, I spotted this dapper white-throated sparrow painted onto an electrical box.

Monday March 17 Saw a pair of red-tailed hawks high up in a tree by the pond, looking like they might have just mated as they were practically on top of each other. After some flapping by the lower one, it took off and flew over the pond.

 

There have been about 40 common mergansers at the pond for the last few days - lovely to see them all. Sometimes they're just swimming about, other times diving for fish. I usually see a few wood ducks, too, in the water near where I saw the pair in the tree the other day.

Tuesday March 18 The first crocuses are out! And on my walks through the neighborhood, I spotted scilla starting to bloom, small grape hyacinths and an impressive witch hazel.

 

Great Horned Owl at its Nest [Combining all my sightings together here]

Wednesday March 19 Spotted a great horned owl sitting on its nest in the Arb, after my neighbor, Mary, told me she saw it yesterday. So great!

Sunday March 23 Met up with a few friends to go see the great horned owl on the nest. There were a couple of other people with cameras and long lenses there when we arrived; they said they'd seen an owlet!! Very exciting! We did see a bit of white fluff, but I couldn't be sure that it wasn't just the white on the front of the neck of the adult.

Great horned owls don't built their own nests. Instead, they usually use an existing one, often built the previous year by red-tailed hawks (or in this case, by Arboretum staff - see the black fabric supporting the nest). Sometimes they use a tree cavity, cliff ledges or even deserted buildings. The female lays between one and four white, nearly spherical 2" diameter eggs and typically does all the incubating (although there have been a few reports of males incubating. The young are enormously cute fluffballs - see this link at All About Birds (and scroll to the right to see more photos).

Tuesday March 25 The adult owl was off the nest when I arrived at lunchtime. As I waited for it to return, I chatted with one of the Arb staff, Brendan Keegan, who is the staff member who installs the platforms for the owls to nest on and monitors the nest. He told me he'd seen three owlets in the nest and thought they're about 2 weeks old; they stay on the nest for about 6 weeks before fledging. As we were chatting, a friendly chickadee left off flitting about the tree next to us to check out my telescope.

Chickadee birding

At one point, I saw the adult owl land in a nearby tree and then, a few minutes later, we watched it fly over and land on the nest. They're magnificent in flight - virtually silent, they seem to come out of nowhere, large wings outspread, gliding. 

Wednesday March 26 Saw the owlets today! Mostly just the tops of two fluffy white heads next to the adult, but at one point one stood up a little. So great to see them!

Thursday March 27 Owlet bobbing up in the nest.

Friday March 28  I went to the nest at dusk today, when the owls were more active. The adult was ripping at some dead thing (see the video) and one of the owlets was standing up.

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Thursday March 20 There are still several dozen common mergansers at the pond. Also saw two pairs of wood ducks on the opposite side of the pond by Perkins Street this morning. 

Saturday March 22 Early this morning, on my way to a Mass Audubon Board meeting in Concord, I spotted a bald eagle flying south on Interstate 95, right over the highway, not that high up, just south of Trapelo Road, near the Cambridge Reservoir. When I told another birder at the meeting about it, he said he saw it, too, in just about the same place. 

After the meeting, went for a walk through the sanctuary and along the Concord River.

Later on, on a walk around my neighborhood, the crocuses are full out - loved seeing all these clustered together. Saw daffodils blooming for the first time this spring, too.

Sunday March 23 The 40 or so common mergansers are still at the pond. I'm expecting that one morning they'll all be gone. Also saw the 2 pairs of wood ducks; I think they'll be hanging around, nesting here.

 

Tuesday March 25 After an evening owl drawing class at the Audubon sanctuary in Canton, I came out to the parking lot to the sound of spring peepers peeping.

Sunday March 30 Morning walk around the pond in a light drizzle.  A pair of wood ducks perched high in a tree overlooking the south end of the pond. A little bit further along, a downy woodpecker flitting around the trees, landing and starting to peck. A muskrat swimming along the shoreline, headed for some large downed tree limbs in the water, diving as it reached them. A Cooper's hawk perched high up in a tree at the north end of the pond. A couple of dozen common mergansers and a single bufflehead swimming along, occasionally diving in a little bay. A red-bellied woodpecker calling from the treetops nearby. And another pair of wood ducks by the edge of the pond just before I got to the boathouse. Pretty great.