Raptor ID help

[Alien J]

Hi! After Miyetti (the Band Tailed Pigeon I raised last summer) was gone, and before I got TD, I became addicted to birdwatching. I only have my phone to take photos with. I am saving up for the Hasselblad Telephoto Zoom mod, but haven't gotten it yet, so I couldn't get a good close up of the bird I saw today.

In the past year I've had two confirmed "uncommon sightings". A Purple Finch and a Cassin's Kingbird! My fiancee and I were fortunate to see a Giant Roadrunner just two days ago! He says in the almost 40 years he has lived in the area he has only seen one, and that was over 30 years ago! Of course, my phone was turned off while charging when the Roadrunner came by.

Since becoming a birdy slave to TD, I haven't spent nearly as much time watching birds, but I do still watch.

Today I saw this bird...




These pics were as good as I could get. I tried my Merlin Bird ID app but to no avail. Then I searched through hundreds of birds of prey pictures. The ones I kept returning to we're these:

Black Chested Buzzard Eagle
Barred Hawk
White Tailed Hawk

However, it would seem that none of these beautiful birds neither live nor breed nor migrate through, Southern California.

I know that the pictures aren't very good, but I was hoping that with the very distinct way the black on it's head comes down towards the chest, and with the shape of it's wings in flight, maybe one of you more experienced birdwatchers could give me an educated guess? Thanks!

 

[expressmailtome]

Bump.

 

[DQTimnehs]

I'm no expert but with a white chest and what looks like a reddish tail, personally I would rule out the Black Chested and White Tailed options. Just guessing though.

 

[Birdbabe]

Looks like a RedTail hawk..you can kind of see mahogany tail feathers and they have cream breast with little brown spots.

 

[Ninna]

You are so lucky! I've just googled Roadrunners - that must have been amazing. What a bird - didn't know it's a cuckoo! You've had some great sightings.

 

[Alien J]

OOPS! Saw the same bird the next day. This time on a closer light pole. I was able to climb up on to the roof of the RV. The hawk was engrossed in his meal (a bird). I have extremely poor eyesight. I always have. Now I also have cataracts. It is a Red Tailed Hawk.

 

[metalstitcher]

Red Tail Hawks are all over the place in Southern California. It's one of the reasons I have never harness trained Gracie as much as I want to. She is snack sized.

 

[Alien J]

They are all over Ohio as well (where I grew up). I saw an American Kestrel not long ago at that same spot. I'm not much of a SoCal fan really, but they do have a large variety of birds!

 

[metalstitcher]

Where I grew up in the high desert we would have a migration path of Turkey Vultures every year and a group of them would roost in our neighbors trees for a few days before moving on. It was pretty neat to see. We had Quail in our yard and road runners every where. Then there where the owls lol Screaming in the middle of the night great way to wake up lol

 

[Ninna]

I'm so jealous of these sightings...on the up side, I suppose I didn't have so much to worry about when I had my pigeon. You can't have everything!