Cooper's Hawk

Cooper's Hawk, adult

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Cooper's Hawk, immature

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1. Description
2. Sound
3. Conservation Status
4. Other Names
5. Cool Facts
6. Full detailed species account

A medium-sized hawk of the forest, the Cooper's Hawk specializes in eating birds. It is built for fast flight through the obstacle course of trees and limbs.

Description

• Medium-sized hawk.
• Tail long, rounded, and barred.
• Wings short and rounded.
• Back dark gray or gray-brown.
• Underparts barred reddish and white.

• Size: 39-50 cm (15-20 in)
• Wingspan: 62-90 cm (24-35 in)
• Weight: 250-597 g (8.83-21.07 ounces)

Sex Differences

Sexes similar in plumage; female larger.

Sound

Alarm call is a series of sharp "cak"s.

Conservation Status

Declines of the Cooper's Hawk in the late 1940s and 1950s were blamed on DDT and pesticide contamination. Populations started increasing in the late 1960s, but it is still listed as threatened or of special concern in a number of states. Appears to be adapting to breeding in urban areas, which may help increase populations. Project FeederWatch data indicate stable or increasing numbers over the last 15 years. For graphs of regional trends of the Cooper's Hawk from PFW data, go here.

Other Names

Épervier de Cooper (French)
Ésmerejón de Cooper (Spanish)

Cool Facts

• Dashing through vegetation to catch birds is a rather dangerous lifestyle. A recent study found that 23 percent of all Cooper's Hawks examined had healed fractures in the bones of the chest, especially of the furcula or wishbone.
• A Cooper's Hawk captures a bird with its feet, and will squeeze it repeatedly to kill it. It does not bite the prey to kill it in the fashion of falcons, but holds it away from its body until it dies. It has been known to drown its prey, holding a bird under water until it stops moving.

• Large numbers of Cooper's Hawks can be seen on migration, especially at hawk watches such as Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania; Cape May, New Jersey, Goshute Mountain Range, Nevada, or Braddock Bay, New York. Autumn movements generally begin in late August and continue through early November. Young Cooper's Hawks tend to migrate about a week earlier than adults, and females tend to go earlier than males by a few days.

Sources used to construct this page:

1. Rosenfield, R. N., and J. Bielefeldt. 1993. Cooper's Hawk (Accipiter cooperii). In The Birds of North America, No. 75 (A. Poole, and F. Gill, eds.). The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, PA, and The American Ornithologists' Union, Washington, D.C.
2. Roth, A. J., G. S. Jones, and T. W. French. 2002. Incidence of naturally-healed fractures in the pectoral bones of North American Accipiters. Journal of Raptor Research 36: 229-230.