our friend, the red-tailed hawk

I've only been out of the city for a few years--only to move to another urban setting, though much, much smaller. I'd like to think that I've pretty much adapted to life out here in the vaguely settled wilderness of the West, but then I'm brought face to face with nature and am quickly reminded I'm what the yokels would refer to as 'city folk.'

I opened up my front door to leave for work this morning when I saw something alien perched on one of my fence posts. It was large and feathered and it had its back to me, but there was definitely no mistaking that it was large and feathered. Large and Feathered.

I handled it pretty well, I think. I'd seen such things of course, maybe quickly as I zoomed past in an automobile, or behind large iron bars at a zoo, but certainly not in my front yard. My first reaction was "What the fuck is that?" It certainly wasn't no pidgeon. But soon, my foothills-drive training kicked in and I recognized that this magnificent bird was indeed, our friend, the red-tailed hawk.

According to Wikipedia, this delightful beast shouldn't have been such a stranger to me after all, as they are thriving throughout the United States. There are even a pair living in my hometown megapolis:

The Red-tailed Hawk is common and widespread, partly because it has benefited from European settlement. The clearing of trees in the east provided hunting areas, and the practice of sparing woodlots left nest sites. Conversely, the planting of trees in the west provided nest sites where there had been none. The construction of highways with treeless medians and shoulders and with utility poles alongside provided perfect habitat for perch-hunting, so Red-tailed Hawks are now a common sight along highways. Finally, these birds have moved into New York and other cities, as in the successful non-fiction book Red-Tails in Love: A Wildlife Drama in Central Park, by Marie Winn. Winn wrote about one of the most famous of them, Pale Male.

The bird got all turned its head and regarded me once or twice before flapping its might wings and taking off to be Large and Feathered somewhere else. Fare thee well, mighty bird.