Gray Hawk

About the Gray Hawk

A small, elegant, tropical hawk at the very northern edge of its range, the Gray Hawk is a bird of subtropical riverside woodlands. Adults are a clean, pale gray finely barred below, with a boldly banded black-and-white tail - trim and almost falcon-like in flight, more so than most of its bulkier buteo relatives.

Gray Hawks hunt lizards and snakes as well as small birds and mammals, often watching from cover within the trees and darting out in a quick, agile dash. Their whistled, downslurred call carries through the riparian canopy in spring.

In Texas they are scarce, local breeders tied to the wooded corridors of the Rio Grande and its resacas in the Lower Valley, arriving mainly for the warm months - a coveted South Texas specialty.

A note from behind the lens: this one takes local knowledge and patience along Valley river trails. Learn a nesting pair's favored perches, work the soft light filtering through the cottonwoods, and be ready for a fast, low pass between the trees.