Cooper's Hawk
Accipiter cooperii · Raptors
Cooper's Hawk, looking back
Prospect Park, 1 March 2026
A Cooper's Hawk in a Prospect Park tree, looking back over its shoulder. Cooper's is an Accipiter, a bird-hunting hawk built for chasing through trees, and a few decades ago it was a bird of deep woodland. It is now among the commonest raptors in American cities, hunting pigeons, starlings and sparrows around feeders and lawns, and the park has a resident pair.
An adult: the dark grey cap, the orange-red eye and the fine rufous barring across the breast, which is what is turned towards the camera. The long banded tail hanging below the branch, rounded at the tip, is the other mark - the Red-shouldered and Red-tailed Hawks of the same park are broad-winged, short-tailed Buteos that soar and sit.
Cooper's Hawk
Prospect Park, 15 November 2025
A Cooper's Hawk in Prospect Park in November, a bird-hunting hawk of the eastern woods that has become, within a few decades, one of the commonest raptors in American cities. Songbirds drawn to feeders make for reliable hunting, and the park has a resident pair.
A blue-grey back, fine reddish barring on the breast, and a bright orange eye that darkens with age. Built for speed through cover rather than open-sky soaring. A study of Cooper's Hawk skeletons found that nearly a quarter had healed fractures in the chest, from hitting branches at full speed.
Birds, insects, plants and other wildlife, mostly from Brooklyn, with some from further afield.
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