Featured Image: A painting of Broad-winged Hawks, Buteo platypterus, by John James Audubon.

By Eliana Patt

Given our position in the midst of the North American Central Flyway, it should come as no surprise to a Travis County birdwatcher that we boast a great number of species of hawk throughout the year. While some species, such as Red-tailed Hawks, Red-shouldered Hawks, and Cooper’s Hawks are all year-round residents in Central Texas, many of our species of hawk are migratory. Perhaps the most numerous of these species is the Broad-winged Hawk.

A flock of soaring Broad-winged Hawks, also known as a kettle, can number well into the thousands. They overwinter in southern Mexico, Central America, and northern South America, and prefer densely forested habitat regardless of the time of year. These birds occur in Travis County primarily during the month of April, though unlike most of our other migratory hawks, a decent number do stick around to breed.

A map of the range of Broad-winged Hawks from Cornell Lab.

While spring may be the best time of year to spot this species in Central Texas, if a Texas birder wants to see Broad-winged Hawks in their greatest numbers, with thousands of birds kettling in unison during migration, they had best turn their eyes towards the Gulf Coast during the fall. Corpus Christi hosts the HawkWatch International Celebration of Flight in late September and early October during their peak migration season. In addition, this species is often present in numbers during migration in other coastal cities like Galveston as well as in the Rio Grande Valley.

Of course, Broad-winged hawks are far from our only local hawk species. However, they are a great deal smaller than Red-tailed Hawks. They are also both smaller and stockier than Red-shouldered Hawks, with a sharp and high whistling call that can help distinguish them at a distance. Juveniles of this species are likely to be mistaken for Red-shouldered Hawks, though are bulkier and will have a uniform brown wing. Juvenile Cooper’s Hawks have a longer tail and a much more slender frame, though also appear similar. On the other hand, adult Broad-winged Hawks are far more easy to separate, with an often densely speckled breast and a very prominent white stripes on their black-and-white banded tail. Some confusion may arise if a birder is lucky enough to spot a dark morph of this species, but their diminutive size and the still-sharp banding on their tails rules out other buteoine hawks.

Sources:

University of Pittsburgh Library
Cornell Lab | All About Birds | Broad-Winged Hawk
HawkWatch International | Events | Celebration of Flight