Northern Harrier - The marsh hunter.

I have only seen Northern Harriers a few times, but each opportunity afforded some speculation as to its behaviour.  They seem to cruise at low altitude, scarcely a few meters above the ground, and always over marshy plains next to a large water body.  I saw one last year along the Pitt River in Maple Ridge as it surveilled the landscape beneath it.  Yesterday I was out at Steveston in the far reaches of Richmond and enjoyed another encounter.

The large size of the raptor, its distinctive white rump, and the banded tail substantiated my conclusion on its identity.  The brown shades underwing testifies to the individual's sex; a female.  She apparently spends a great deal of her day scanning the area of her domain looking for prey.  They mainly consume small mammals such as mice, voles, rats, and rabbits but will take birds and even grasshoppers.  Unlike other hawks, the northern harrier keeps low to the ground.  They have exceptional hearing and can locate prey through sound similar to what owls do.

I noticed that my images revealed a relatively small head given the size of the bird.  A closer examination showed similarities to the facial features of owls.  This may be an example of convergent evolution where traits are selected that enhance a species' chance of survival.  When I first saw the bird I thought it may have been a marsh hawk.   The two are in fact one and the same as the species was renamed back in 1982 by the AOU (American Ornithologists' Union) as the new moniker showed the relationship between this bird and other harriers around the globe.

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