Swoop!
Taking a break from my exam prep I went to lie on the deck in the garden. Amsterdam has been enjoying a few days of tropical heat, though today it thunderstormed off and on. By 9:30 pm it was dry, the sun low but not yet set, the garden serene and beautiful. I stretched out on my side, phone in one hand, facing into the garden and away from the canal.
Suddenly a wild rush of wings, and a bird carrying something large flew low over me. It took a couple of seconds to register: a small hawk of some kind, a dead bird in his beak. Yes, without scientific evidence, I assigned him a gender. He landed on one of the low garden walls and, unable to hold his prey any longer, dropped it to the level below, a ~30 cm (12 inch) drop.
He sat there staring straight at me with a yellow-ringed black eye — first one side, then twisting his head almost all the way around to fix me through the other. I wondered if it was a hawk or an owl, but leaned towards hawk. I stared back, fascinated, frozen, hesitant to scare him off and a little scared myself — he was less than 3 meters away. I had goosebumps.
The staring went on for, oh, a minute or two. Then, as suddenly as he had come, he flew to the tree in the neighbor’s garden.
He sat there staring straight at me with a yellow-ringed black eye – first one side, then twisting his head almost all the way around to fix me through the other. I wondered if it was a hawk or an owl, but leaned towards hawk. I stared back, fascinated, frozen, hesitant to scare him off and a little scared myself – he was less than 3 meters away. I had goosebumps.
The staring went on for, oh, a minute or two. Then, as suddenly as he had come, he flew to the tree in the neighbor’s garden.
I took the chance to scoot indoors, tell B and grab my camera. We went back out armed with the shooting device and sat at the table at a safer distance, talking quietly: he’s unlikely to leave his kill for someone else, he’ll definitely come back to eat. I spotted him on the tree branch, still watching us warily. We lost sight of him for a bit, then he swooped back in – not straight to the kill, though. He landed on the low wall and looked all around, assessing. Finally deciding we were no threat, he jumped down to eat.
We got a few photos in, with our phones and the telephoto lens on the camera. What a brilliant bird of prey – never seen one in the wild this close. Urban wild, but wild nevertheless.
He ate with gusto, sending fluffy white dove feathers flying, not caring who watched, yet keeping a wary eye on his surroundings after each bite. He’ll leave a mess of feathers and bone, I’m sure.
Running the photos through Google Lens, I identified him as a Eurasian sparrowhawk, sperwer in Dutch. At first I thought he might be a juvenile, he was quite small – but reading up, I learned the males are smaller, and his plumage marked him as an adult. Any bigger and I wouldn’t have stood around for photos.
Meanwhile the great tits got nervous and started twittering alarm calls. They had nested in our garden until recently, the chicks fledging just a couple of days ago. The canal too was suddenly full of water-bird activity: the local coot and water hen, a visiting family of mallards, all swimming around in front of us. The ducks had four or five little ones – I felt a flicker of anxiety for them with the hawk so close, but he was focused on his kill and had no time for chicks.
Then the summer skies broke open – thunder, lightning, rain, the whole works. Just in time, we scuttled indoors, leaving the hawk to his poor dove. Did my hawk finish his meal or fly to take shelter? It’s dark and late now, I’ll only see the evidence left in the morning.