A Sharp-shinned hawk is one of nature’s speed machines, a fast and very agile flyer that can pursue small birds through thick forested stands of trees. It likes to ambush its prey from cover, or chase its prey for a quick grasp.

Small songbirds are on its menu which includes sparrows, wood warblers, finches, wrens, nuthatches or thrushes, or other small bird species of opportunity. The largest recorded prey taken was a ruffed grouse. The smallest was an Anna’s hummingbird. Most of the time sparrow sized bird species are targeted.

While small birds are on its diet list, a sharpie is perfectly willing and able to capture dragonflies in the air. Bats may also be taken.

Rodents like mice, frogs, small snakes or lizards may also become hawk protein. It all goes for a good cause to help this small hawk species survive. Biologists have learned that 90 percent of the foods captured by sharpies are small birds.

When it comes to survival, sharpies must look out for its larger look-alike cousin the Cooper’s hawk, who will, if given the chance, kill any sharpie it can catch. American Goshawks and peregrine falcons will attempt to kill sharpies.

The competition between birds of prey for many of the same food sources implies that in the hawk world, hawks of all types had better be very careful all the time. The chances of ending up as food for a larger hawk is ever present. What we humans will never completely learn is how various predators interact in their own interest.

Sharp-shinned hawk females are about 11-15 inches long, including its long tail. Males are smaller at about 9 to 12 inches.

Wingspans of females are approximately 23-17 inches, while male wingspans are 17-23 inches. Body weight of females ranges from 5 to 8 ounces and males tip scales at 3 to 4 ounces. Even at this small size, they are superbly adapted to fill niches within the predator/prey avian bird world.

When it comes to secrecy, Sharp-shinned hawks are careful in nest selection sites to minimize attracting attention from enemies. The preferred nest will be in dense conifer trees of pine, spruce or fir.

Some hardwood trees will work also if the cover is adequate, well under the canopy but toward the top of these trees. A nest is built of twigs to create a four to six inch deep cluster that will be about 12 to 20 inches in diameter.

It will usually be built on horizontal limbs next to the tree trunk. Female so most of the nest building but both male and female assist each other in gathering all the twigs needed to make that home.

Eggs can number from three to eight — on average, however, three to four is more common. One brood is raised per year. Eggs are brooded for 30 to 35 days.

Once hatched, the young will stay for 21 to 28 days before flying away to join in hunts. Parent birds will continue to bring food to the nest, and later, young will learn to take food from the parents’ talons while in flight. Only very agile flyers can pull off food gathering maneuvers like that.

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A reminder of a natural history television show on public TV is coming April 10. It is titled “Raptors, A Fistful of Daggers,” a good title to describe everything from eagles to falcons. Birds of prey have excellent vision, sharp talons on their toes to grasp prey, and sharp beaks to kill by a bite to the neck.

This two part series features photography that will be exceptional allowing viewers to see things that are normally very hard to see with binoculars alone. So I plan to enjoy and learn more about raptors by watching this educational film. I hope you can tune in and watch for yourself.

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Our spring weather patterns have set in. With that comes rain, and wind, and wind and rain, and even a few snowflakes. Hopefully measurable snow is not in our future.

We never know how oscillations in the northern hemispheric jet stream will plunge southward with cold air, or lazily keep really cold air north of us and allow spring warm air to take hold. One thing for sure is that Mother Nature rules, and we get to adapt.

I happen to like warm sunny days during April interspersed with slow moderate rains once per week. I think Mother Nature has her own plan to follow. What we humans wish for and what we

get will be two different things.

Here is another point to remember: climate and weather are two different things. Weather is what is happening now. Climate is long term data sets of hundreds to multi-thousands of year timespans, and since the climate is always adjusting over long time frames within even broader paradigms, us humans must keep our truth detector antennae on full alert to spot propaganda attempts by activists and politicians feeding at federal grant money machines.

There are unfortunately those who would have us believe that mankind can control the climate. Not so. Climate has everything to do with our sun and its own idiosyncrasies of behavior.

Add to that these controlling celestial facts. The Earth’s orbit around the sun varies from almost circular to slightly elliptical on a 100,000 year cycle. Earth’s axial tilt also varies on a 39,000 to

40,000 year cycle. And the earth’s axis wobbles over a time frame of about every 19,000 years. When these related cycles happen to work together, sometimes above or below average, they can emphasize each other to either initiate warmer interglacial warm periods (like we are

now in) or begin the long term cooling trends that initiate those trends causing glacial growth in all northern hemispheric environments.

A long term glacial episode can easily be a 100,000 year long thing. Iowa’s landscape is full of the clues to many past glacial episodes.

Thick glacial ice has at one time or another covered all of many portions of Iowa. Permafrost conditions were the norm, and when inter-glacial warmings began to re-dominate, water melting from glaciers carved deer river valleys and transported large amounts of sediments across the land surface.

Tundra vegetation eventually gave way as the climate warmed and dried, to grow boreal forests. Then with more warming, deciduous trees found the land to its advantage. Later still, as more warming took place, trees were less common and grasses dominated.

Under those grasses with deep root systems, rich topsoil developed. The entire Midwest farming and ranching industries rely on soils to grow grasses and crops — all this because of past glacial episodes.

The most recent glacial episodes have left evidence for geologists to interpret for us. Their science based data tell us of the rock record showing 33 glacial maximums, and thus 33 inter-glacial warmer times, during the last 2.6 million years of earth history. Rock records, deep sea sediment cores, and ice core samples support these natural climatic fluctuations of earth history stories.

I trust you will dig deep into truth detecting sciences of Earth’s long and varied natural history. By doing so you can come to your own conclusions of how modern day propagandists are trying to make you believe untruths for political advantage.

Facts matter. Thanks for listening.

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On another note, I checked how the Iowa River is adjusting to recent rains. It appears that for the most part, recent rains have soaked into the soil and not created very much runoff into small streams, creeks and ultimately the river itself.

All winter long the river was low and slow with readings at the gage station staying steady. Once our late March and early April rains fell, the river level did come up about six inches.

This was just enough to barely cover exposed sandbars in the Timmons Grove County park area. As of mid week, the water level is slowly going down a bit, and holding. We all know the capacity for a weather event to bring strong spring rains, enough to change things overnight. Stay tuned and be prepared.

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“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson,

Naturalist

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Garry Brandenburg is the retired director of the Marshall County Conservation Board. He is a graduate of Iowa State University with a BS degree in Fish & Wildlife Biology.