Ever wonder why they go after the head?
Theory is or has been that the brains are highly nutritious and also taste good to hawk and owls. Where prey numbers are high enough it is not uncommon for hawks to just eat the head, if you raise enough chickens with hawks around you most likely have seen that.
Mayo Clinic Rochester, Mn. has participated in a peregrine falcon breeding program since the mid 80's with a nesting pair on top of one the taller buildings. There are plenty of pigeons for them to pick from and they often eat just the heads in mid air after the kill and drop the rest on the sidewalks below. We have a team that goes around and picks up the dead pigeons every morning before patients show up. Apparently some are offended by headless bloodied pigeons in their path.
There are only something like 50 nesting pair of peregrine falcons in Mn. and most are in man made structures. The birds that are moved to the bluffs along the Mississippi river which is their nature habit usually don't make it through the first year. Great Horned Owls are the reason why. The peregrine is one of the few raptors that can give a GHO a run for the money. But the GHO pick them off at night sitting on the cliffs and the main reason their numbers are not climbing.
While fly fishing a couple of years ago stumbled across one of the few peregrine nesting pair in the wild here.
Have been checking on them for the last 2 years and so far still around.
I also shoot a lot of bald eagles. While I watch them pick off a coot once in awhile, and bless them they are welcome to all they can get LOL, they aren't the most "rapture" of raptures. Have watched dozens of them pick through fresh spread manure in a field. And old road kill is not beneath them. They also spend more time trying to steal food from other eagles then they do getting their own. They are certainly a different type of rapture than owls and hawks in my book.
Baldies are also the easiest to shoot. With the camera of course. Hawks are much harder and owls the most difficult of all. I like hooters the best personally.
