So this guy has been coming around and feasting on the dove that eat in our yard. I’m happy to feed the dove and let this guy dine here because he’s super cool. One day he was holding the dead dove with one talon, and yarding out feathers with the other. I failed to capture a pic of that.
Well today he came back at lunchtime and we were able to get a couple pics, and he tripped the security (bird) camera in the backyard. The first two are from my iPhone, the last one is the Arlo camera.
Here are the pics.
This is in Clarkdale AZ, at the base of Mingus Mountain.
The tree branch where the bird is stationary is 6.5” in diameter.
The pics I posted are the best that I have. I posted super large photos so hopefully some detail can be seen. If they’re too big, I’ll repost smaller ones.

Looks like a Falcon to me. They are definitely native to AZ. Beautiful Raptor!

Beancooker ...

Before becoming an attorney, my daughter was going to be a veterinarian working with PAWS in our area with the raptors.

After looking at the photos she believes that the bird is an osprey.

I'm gonna guess a red shouldered hawk.

https://www.audubon.org/field-.../red-shouldered-hawk

Sharp shinned hawk.

o5

I should add, the iPhone photos, the colors are very accurate. Reddish rust colored belly with stripes, and gray back. Talons are yellow.

I was thinking prairie falcon, but really, I have no clue.

The Osprey that lives two houses down on top of the mast of our neighbors’ sailboat doesn’t look like that. I’m going to guess Cooper’s Hawk over Sharp-Shinned Hawk based on how straight the front of the wing is. The front of the wings on a Sharp-Shinned Hawk are sort shaped like a boomerang.

Beancooker ... even the old detective myself is not seeing the comparison with the prairie falcon.

Either a Cooper’s hawk or as mentioned above, a sharp shinned hawk. Coopers prey on more medium sized birds; shins more songbird size, but the female shins will go for larger prey.
Very cool that you get to observe this.

Mars may be the guy to ask.

Here in Western Montana, near the Missouri River, Osprey will plop down next to gopher holes and wait for the prey to emerge. Interesting to me, I saw that they would not pickup a fresh rim fire kill within their reach. Turning up the beak as if to say no thanks, they will wait to kill their own and fly off to the nest to feed the youngsters.
I have watched them lose their grip, drop a trout on a gravel bar and not retrieve it but resume fishing for a new one. Beautiful creatures.

Rust belly and chest, grey back, eats birds, sounds like a Coopers Hawk or Sharp-shinned Hawk. My guess is Coopers Hawk. Sharp-shinned Hawks prefer forested areas, Coopers get along fine in the suburbs.

quote:

Originally posted by weiser09:
I'm gonna guess a red shouldered hawk.

https://www.audubon.org/field-.../red-shouldered-hawk

That was my guess…
We had a nesting pair in my yard. They were big and noisy.

Mostly a permanent resident in west and south; northern birds migrate, but do not travel far. Some movement in winter as far south as central Mexico.

Go to the app store. Download the “Merlin” app. Answer the questions. The possible birds are shown. Match the picture to your bird.

This is a hawk. Very common behavior, seen in neighborhoods everywhere. Challenging to tell the difference between Coopers and red-shouldered.

 
Dove and quail are frequent prey here for raptors. I've watched GHOs at dusk come get quail where they gather before roosting, and smaller raptors (hawks) chase birds on the wing in broad daylight. The prey bird is so rattled it sometimes just crashes right into our fence. Beancooker, I've seen your hawk around here, too, but I've forgotten what species I found when I looked it up.
 
One of the neatest raptors around here is the Harris Hawk. I believe we are at the northern edge of their AZ range. They are pack hunters, usually seen in groups of 3 or 4, and they employ traditional pack hunting methods, such as taking turns chasing the prey to exhaustion. They are pretty large birds.

It doesn’t appear to have red shoulders, but more importantly, the picture was taken in Arizona which, according to the internet, is outside of the Red-shouldered Hawk’s range.

Huge thanks to all that chimed in. It gave me a direction to look and see what it could be. In comparing the sharp shined vs Cooper’s Hawk, I am now quite certain it is a Cooper’s Hawk. A few different pages described the differences, but this page made it pretty clear. The description of body shape, head size, and most of all the overall size are what makes me think it’s a Cooper’s Hawk.

I definitely appreciate everyone’s feedback. Without it, I wouldn’t have known where to look.

I may stop by the local state park (Dead Horse Ranch) as I understand the park rangers there are extremely knowledgeable about the local birds. Id like to hear their thoughts and what I can do to make my yard more attractive to this Hawk.

We get a pair of Cooper's Hawks that come here every spring to raise babies. We are at the start of their breeding season now and the breeding adults are here and very busy. I love hearing their high-pitched calls to one another every spring and watching the fledglings learning to fly and hunt. Our squirrels become reclusive when they are around. From your photos I am pretty sure you have a Cooper's Hawk. The bands on the tail are pretty convincing.

I only knew anything because of the fairly similar discussion here last year:

Link

We get similar hawks around me, the best I've come up with is a Cooper. I asked bird folks and they pretty much agreed.