Hi Irene,
I wish to heck that I could lay claim to that photo, but it's not mine, I just linked it here from flickr for identification purposes and gave credit to the photogragher.
You're welcome for the information, that's why we are all on this board in the first place, to share what knowledge we know with each other. It's the way that I learned all about Hawks myself, the sharing of knowledge. I went to a Hawk Watch 2 years ago not knowing a thing and everyone there was more than willing to teach me anything and everything they knew, including some very simple but effective tips on how to identify raptors quickly as they fly past. People always ask how we can look up at a hawk and within a few seconds know exactly what type it is, and we reply "after seeing a few hundred it becomes very easy." An expert Hawkwatcher taught me something that really made alot of sense, he said "eventually it becomes the same as finding your child in a large crowd, you know it's your child the instant you look at him/her and no further inspection is needed." After attending 2 complete Hawk Watches (fall '08 for 4 months and fall '09 for 4 months) I'm starting to feel quite confident in my hawk ID'ing ability although I'm no expert by any means.
Birders are the friendliest bunch of people!!!
Walter
