On January 23, 2023, I was sitting in the yard photographing birds when this accipiter (a juvenile Cooper’s hawk) flew in, scattering all of the other birds in the yard. I managed a few photos before it left.

Here it’s peering down into our brush pile to where many of the birds flee when the accipiter arrives.

I have a raptor expert in Seattle who has been very helpful in identifying accipiters for me. In this case, when processing photos, I noticed that I could get a partial reading of the band on the bird’s leg, ie “257”.

I contacted my expert in Seattle (who is himself a raptor bander) and he contacted the biologist who runs the raptor trapping program at SeaTac Airport who provided the following information.

“(The biologist) released two relocated juvenile Coops this winter in the Skagit area, one was 1204-25785, released March’s Point and the other 1204-25784 released along Bayview-Edison Rd.  Either one could have made its way to your yard.  Good luck getting the other numbers!”

This spurred me into re-examining my photos and in doing so I was able to discern two additional numbers… “85”. So this was a bird trapped at SeaTac Airport (to prevent collision strikes with planes) and released on March Point. The release location is a relatively short hop across or around Fidalgo Bay to our Cap Sante neighborhood.

This is the second banded juvenile Cooper’s hawk that has made an appearance in our yard and whose origin I was able to trace thanks to my Seattle contact.