Roadside Raptors and Such

If there is one thing I know for sure, it's that the drive from North Liberty, IN to Painesville, OH should be considered one of the rarest forms of torture. True this drive is a straight-shot on the Indiana and then Ohio toll roads but it offers very little more than corn fields. That's why on Christmas afternoon when we started the trip I was so easily swayed when Scott said "hey, let's play a game." The game.....counting all the roadside raptors we could see with the unaided eye.

And the results were........

Indiana (on the trip to Ohio)
American Kestrel-3
Cooper's Hawk-1
Bald Eagle-2
Rough-Legged Hawk-1
Red-Tailed Hawk-8

Ohio (still on the way there)
American Kestrel-5
Red-Tailed Hawk- 21

Ohio (on the way home)
Red-Tailed Hawk-28
Cooper's Hawk-1
Peregrine Falcon-1
American Kestrel-5
Bald Eagle-2

Indiana (almost home and starting to get dark)
Red-Tailed Hawk- 2
American Kestrel-1
Barred Owl-1


The second part of the game occured when Scott also decided that the blog needed a picture of a Red-Tailed Hawk to go with the post. I mean how hard can it be to get a picture of a roadside hawk? Every time we would see one I would then hear "oh man I should have stopped" or "that would have made a great picture." Needless to say we learned the hard way that it is very difficult to get a good picture of a hawk while traveling 70+ miles an hour on the toll road with traffic. Hmm who would have thought? The above picture is instead taken the day after the trip outside of Potato Creek State Park, but you get the idea.


Although not the highest quality, this is a picture of one of the Bald Eagles that we saw soaring in Ohio not too far from the Sandusky exit. No matter how many I've seen them, there is still something amazing about seeing a Bald Eagle in flight.

The final score: Scott and Lindsay 1, Boredom 0.