How can I be expected to pay attention to gulls when there are immature red-tailed hawks in the sun. I've been going out and watching gulls when I can. I figured that I know my hawks so well since I watch them constantly--especially in the fall, that maybe if I watch herring and ring-billed gulls enough, I'll find a Thayer's or glaucous gull on my own. But I try to watch gulls and I find a perfectly posed red-tailed hawk in the sun and had to take photos.

Speaking of red-tailed hawks, I got this interesting note from Lori Arent, Clinic Manager for The Raptor Center:

"On Monday, the clinic received a banded red-tailed hawk that was dead on arrival. We checked our database and the bird was here before! It originally came in on 6/1/07 from Lesser Prairie as a brancher that was suffering from a maggot-infested neck wound. Eight days later, the bird was fostered with a new red-tailed hawk family in New Hope, MN. The adoption obviously worked well and the bird survived a year and a half until being struck by a car near the airport (Hwy 5) a few days ago."

It's sad that ultimately the hawk was hit by a car, but interesting to get actual proof that putting young raptors in foster nests when it's no longer possible to put them in their original nests actually works (and proof that raptors can't count).