About your question

Cooper’s hawks (COHA) do not have an affinity for the sky, related to my previous post. I think now, that it is best for you to determine where the air becomes the sky. But that is only part of the equation. For example, you might say that the sky starts at one- hundred fifty feet of altitude. So, here is the question you should be asking— if COHA do not have an affinity for the sky— but only during migration; Then how the hell does a COHA wind - up on top of a 200 foot evergreen tree, which is located in the middle of a field? Or on top of a 200 foot building? Here is one more example: I am hiking at Deception Pass State Park. The first part to the Goose Rock is steep, then you level off, then you go steep again, all the time through the trees, in order to reach the top, which is a saddle with a great view. The saddle is mostly grassy and mossy, with just a small tree or two. However, when you reach the top, there is a perched COHA! Or you are standing there taking in the sights of the flat pasture land and evergreen trees, when a raptor come out of nowhere toward you and low over head. No time for binoculars. 

Actually, the hawk came from below your position. It did not come out of the sky. You spin around and determine that the hawk is a COHA. Or it went to perch. Or it went down the other side of the mountain.


Folk’s, the Goose Rock is 480 feet high. The same situation could present if you were on a mountain side 2,000 feet high. If so, how the heck did that COHA arrive there? And I think “ arrive” is the proper word. 

Please take what I write with a grain of salt. What I am saying is the truth as I know it.
When an object protrudes into the sky; A mountain, a tree or a building, a COHA will treat the structure as a crutch or as a guide-on, at other times as a shield or a “screen.” The hawk will head straight for the screen, at high speed, then will dart around the screen to try and capture prey in the other side. This is because the hawk is sneaky, very sneaky. They will sneak right up the side of a house, sneak along the roof, and then drop down on the other side. Just as when the  hawk is sneaking up the mountain side then sneaking down the other side.

Let us say that a COHA is 300 yards from a 200 foot tall tree in a clearing or a field. If the hawk wishes to get to the top of the tree will the hawk circle or soar upward to about 200 feet altitude, then level off and head for the tree top? NO! The same can be said for a 2,000 foot mountain. If the mountain side is barren the hawk can follow the contour of the mountain side, possibly from 120 feet away from the terrain, starting near the base and flapping upward to the top. Or more likely the hawk will start near the bottom of the mountain side and sneak the way up, or sneak up the mountain side, through the trees, which is the sneakiest way. So, the takeaway is that the hawk was uncomfortable with approaching the object from the sky, which is penetrating into the sky. Therefore, the hawk did not take to the sky, to arrive at the tall object. 

So, what does all this mean? It really does not mean anything. This is the way the species acts or behaves. I can say a bird or two is not a species. 

So, when you observe a raptor in sky and it is not migration time and the hawk is an accipiter: Can you think; That accipiter in the sky is not a COHA, because this guy on the internet says so. So it must be a goshawk or maybe a Sharp- shinned hawk. Absolutely not! You must take into account the object at hand. You must understand and use the proper words to describe what you observe, in order to present the proper words to the proper people.

A field guide with a range map. A range map cannot think. A range map cannot speak. A habitat cannot talk. A habitat cannot think. It’s up to you to describe the hawk in the sky.NB.

The thought : FBI man Christopher Wray will be fired. Should have been months ago. NB.