208 LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



Red-tailed Hawk, instead of living largely on poultry and game birds, as is 

 generally believed, feeds mostly on mice and shrews, as well as on frogs, toads, 

 crawfish, snakes, lizards, and insects of various kinds. Comparatively few of 

 their stomachs, less than one in ten, contained the remains of poultry or game 

 birds, while fully two-thirds contained mice. In the Mississippi and Ohio 

 Valleys, where squirrels abound, they feed very largely on these, and in the 

 more open prairie regions in Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin they live on ground 

 squirrels, gophers, and meadow mice; rabbits also are often caught by them, 

 and small birds but rarely. Pairs of these Hawks frequently hunt together, 

 and in such case it is difficult for even so nimble an animal as a squirrel to 

 escape them. 



In the Middle and Northern States such birds as have migrated, generally 

 return from their winter haunts by the middle of February or the beginning of 

 March, and somewhat later farther northward. During the mating season they 

 are rather noisy, like most Raptores. Their principal call note at these times — 

 generally uttered during their aerial gyrations, while circling about, high in air, 

 chasing and pursuing each other in the vicinity of their future home — is a 

 shrill and far-reaching "kee-aah," repeated at short intervals. Another note, 

 somewhat like "chirr" or "pii-chiir," is also uttered during this season, when 

 perched on some dead limb near their nest. At other seasons they are much 

 more silent. 



There is considerable difference in their nesting habits in some sections, 

 so that while in certain localities most of them nest on high ground, in other 

 places the majority prefer the heavily timbered bottom lands. 



Dr. William L. Ralph has kindly furnished me the following notes on 

 this species, based principally on observations made by him in Oneida and 

 Herkimer Counties, New York. He says: "The Red -tailed Hawks are 

 migrants in this locality, although a few may remain during mild winters. 

 They begin to arrive from the south from the first to the middle of March, 

 and at once commence repairing their old nests or building new ones, and 

 by the 1st of April the first eggs are laid. I think that, with the exception 

 of the Bald Eagle, HaMoetus leucocephalus, this bird nests earlier in this local- 

 ity than any other member of the family Falconidce. The places chosen by 

 them for nesting are rather small woods, and when they nest in large forests, 

 which is seldom, they will be found on the extreme borders. Once in a 

 great while they nest in isolated trees growing in the vicinity of woods. One 

 pair that I have watched with great interest has nested for several years in 

 a large elm tree that is standing in a meadow about 20 rods from a wood 

 where they formerly nested, and from which they were driven by a pair of 

 Great Horned Owls, Bubo virginianus, taking possession of their nest. I have 

 known other instances of the Great Horned Owl appropriating the nest of the 

 Red-tailed Hawk. In one case the Hawks had built a nest which they were 

 occupying at the time I found it, and they used it for two or three years 

 after. It was then taken possession of by the Owls, which held it for two 



