Harlans RTH

[Meagan]

Earlier this year a friend of mine and myself went trapping and caught this beauty. She was an adult so she was released, but not before a few pictures were taken of her.

Front:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo59/MeaganDuf/WBSInternshipand2010Falconry381.jpg


Her tail:
http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo59/MeaganDuf/WBSInternshipand2010Falconry386.jpg

http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo59/MeaganDuf/WBSInternshipand2010Falconry377.jpg

http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo59/MeaganDuf/WBSInternshipand2010Falconry378.jpg

[tony123abc]

They sure are great looking birds.

[Zarafia]

Looks like one to me. And yes, they are gorgeous!

[Pedioecetes]

Harlan's are fascinating birds. They go through here right at the tail end of the Redtail migration. Last fall and this fall there were a lot. I saw a hag female at 50 yards in early November that was completely chocolate brown with a white tail. With the binos I could see a few specs of red and black near the tail feather tips. She was a sight to behold.

[paulmont1719]

Do the passage have a banned tail or can it be dusty colored with no redand dark tip

[OATS]

Yes, juvenile RTs have a banded tail. They look like this.....a few pics of last years Juvie Harlan's I flew and released:

http://i956.photobucket.com/albums/ae45/DirtHawkeref/DSC01318.jpg

http://i956.photobucket.com/albums/ae45/DirtHawkeref/DSC01319.jpg

http://i956.photobucket.com/albums/ae45/DirtHawkeref/DSC01426.jpg

[RyanVZ]

Do the passage have a banned tail or can it be dusty colored with no redand dark tip

There is a lot of variation in Harlan's Hawk Tails, so it would be hard to say. Yellow eyes and stress bars across the tail at the same point would be a better indicator. Here is a link to a really interesting article about Harlan's Hawk tail variation.

http://www.aba.org/birding/v41n1p30.pdf

[tony123abc]

Great article. Now I am utterly confused though. I will go by stress indicators and length. Great post.

[RyanVZ]

Want to be more confused? Several experts have confirmed that this is likely a light morph Harlan's. The barring on the tail and the fact that they only go half way up, and the length between wing tips and tail tips are the indicators that they are going by, but it's still a slightly educated guess at best. Not worth debating but a cool looking bird nonetheless.

BTW. The stress bars confirmed for sure that this is a passage bird.

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs771.snc4/67128_186908221326792_100000228453872_731705_90952 6_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs393.ash2/67128_186908224660125_100000228453872_731706_10415 35_n.jpg

[Squirrelhawkin]

WOW!!! That's a great looking bird!

[Donal]

Absolutely gorgeous bird Ryan . . . Congrats . . . Hope it hunts as well as it looksclapp

[tony123abc]

Fantastic looking bird. Very unique.

[RyanVZ]

Absolutely gorgeous bird Ryan . . . Congrats . . . Hope it hunts as well as it looksclapp

My apprentice is hoping the same thing. He trapped it and released a jack catching male Red-tail for it. dohh So the pressure is on. thumbsupp

[harrishawk_79]

well if for some reason he wants to turn that one loose i would love to transfer it to me lol

[GregMik]

Want to be more confused? Several experts have confirmed that this is likely a light morph Harlan's. The barring on the tail and the fact that they only go half way up, and the length between wing tips and tail tips are the indicators that they are going by, but it's still a slightly educated guess at best. Not worth debating but a cool looking bird nonetheless.

BTW. The stress bars confirmed for sure that this is a passage bird.


Ryan,

Looks more like a Kriders than a Harlans.

Greg

[REYNALDO]

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs771.snc4/67128_186908221326792_100000228453872_731705_90952 6_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs393.ash2/67128_186908224660125_100000228453872_731706_10415 35_n.jpg

this picture reminds me of a fishing eagle we have in the Philippines. that bird looks awesome. we have "bigger" birds here in the east coast but you guys are lucky to be able to get a hold of birds that are cool like this one!

http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/photo193214.htm its called a white-bellied fishing eagle

[Grahame]

Beautiful Harlan's. Truly are gorgeous birds.

Grahame Booth
Calgary, Alberta, Canada

[Meagan]

We trapped a bird that was similar to that white one a week ago for a friend who was looking for a large female. We kept him for a bit, he weighed in at 950 grams, so he was a bit on the tiny side for what my friend wanted. But we noticed something rather odd with him. He had the white tail with black barring on 9 of his tail feathers. But the two deck feathers and one just to the right had already grown in a light pink with slight, light barring part way up and then turned white. He was going to be a beautiful bird when he became an adult but we tossed him back out due to his small size. But he did not have the pure white head like that one does...simply a beautiful bird.

[Pedioecetes]

We see birds like this up here every year, usually in late summer to mid-fall though some in July. We've always assumed they were Kriders. The typical plumaged Harlans migration through here is late October to early November. It is a fast passage, we only see Harlans for a couple of weeks. Given where they come from (n. BC, Yukon, Alaska) that time frame seems realistic. One of my friends trapped a very dark female in late October (this fall) which he feels is a redtail, yet it's tail is almost identical to the pics from Eric F, while its back has almost no marks on it at all. We'll have to see how she molts. We get very dark haggard redtails in late fall too, but their tails are typical redtail tails, no resemblance to the typical Harlans haggard. Some of the birds we call Kriders are even whiter than the one in your pictures, but still have a partially barred tail as a juvenile. The adults never seem to have a full red tail, but are washed out red/pink with fleckings in it of darker brown/black and the upper half is usually whitish. I have to admit I really know nothing of the natural history of either other than 50 years of "bird watching". Maybe what we think we are seeing is not what we're really seeing.

[FredFogg]

Ryan,

Looks more like a Kriders than a Harlans.

Greg

I would say Kriders too! Definately a juvie, the tail length compared to the wing lengths say juvie to me. Beautiful bird, sure wish we had the variations that you all have. Our only variation is maybe a slight different shade of brown. Boring! LOL :D

[sandman]

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs771.snc4/67128_186908221326792_100000228453872_731705_90952 6_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs393.ash2/67128_186908224660125_100000228453872_731706_10415 35_n.jpg

What a beauty!:eek: clappclappclapp
I hope to someday trap a krider's, and also at some point a melanistic. But I am getting ahead of myself. frus)
Have to get a first bird first, then about a billion things to learn from it (and sponsor!). Imma go cry now LOL.

[RyanVZ]

Looks like a kriders to me too, but as I understand it, some of the physical characteristics suggests that it is a light morph Harlan's.

Again as I understand it......Kriders are just an anomaly of a normal red-tail, they could just be called a white redtail or piebald or whatever the correct term is. They have the potential to show up anywhere across the range of Red-tailed hawks. Harlans are largely a separate breeding population (Harlans breeds to Harlans most of the time) of redtails that are generally very dark in color with the cool looking tails. In the Harlan's hawks there are also anomalies that come out white instead of the normal dark coloring. So basically one could say this bird is the Kriders of the Harlans Hawk (if you believe it is a light morph Harlans).

Anyway, as I said above its really not worth debating because it is a cool looking bird and it's definitely a Red-tail no matter how ya spin it. I was just relaying what some Red-tail color experts had suggested to us it was.

[MrBill]

I agree, Fred--it's a Kriders (as Kriders go). But, I also agree with Ryan that there is no sense debating the issue because it has never been established the the Harlans' is separate subspecies to begin with; in fact, a friend of mine told me recently that there is a DNA study proviing that a RT is a RT is a RT, and that includes the Harlans.

Bill Boni