Yesterday morning, both of my friendly neighbourhood red tail hawks were using the updrafts between my condo buildings to hunt.  Not the greatest shot through two panes of dirty solarium windows ...

 

 

I think they may actually have been dive-bombing pigeons and/or squirrels in the park next door, because at one point, one of the hawks was actually flying between the buildings below my sight line.  And I’m on the 22^nd floor!  When I was downloading the only decent shots I got to my laptop, I realised I have been photographing ...

 (a) either this exact pair of hawks or

 (b) off-spring of the first hawk I saw

 – since December 2009. 

The particularly bad shots of hawks perched on a railing or the green roof were actually taken through my solarium window.  The railing surrounds the outdoor patio on the roof of the condo directly across from me.  The two buildings are separated by, maybe, three driveway widths.  The other photos were taken in one or other of two parks within walking distance from my condo.

 

December, 2009

January, 2010

 March, 2011

March, 2011

May, 2011

June, 2011

March, 2012

May, 2012

June, 2012

 

July, 2012

October, 2012

August 2013

 

I think a pair of hawks (the pair I saw yesterday?  Don't know.) have been nesting in the evergreen tree in a small woodlot just up the road from me, right next to a high school, since 2009.  Needless to say, whenever I'm driving or walking by the woodlot and I spot a hawk in the trees - I dash across four lanes of traffic into the wood lot or pull a hard left on the steering wheel and skid into the high school parking lot. 

 

... but not, I hasten to add, when classes are in!



Apparently this morning, I was the only one standing between the chickadees and imminent starvation!!!!!

I tried bribing them with all the Dollarama sunflower seeds they could eat … but no one would admit to having seen my lost mitt ….

Then on the way back to the car, near one of the park benches - all frozen and dirty and mangy was my mitt!!!!

 

...  useless chickadees ...

.. it may be that only mad dogs and Englishmen go out In the noon day sun ….

but photographers apparently go out in the rain!!!

 

And not just photographers!!

 

In the interests of full disclosure, I did know it was raining before I left the house.  I traipsed around the woods with two cameras, and what little was left of my common sense, for about 90 minutes. 

And promptly lost my mitt!  I think there's a lesson in there somewhere!