October 7, 1999

Hi folks, we had a slow one today. In a way, it has been a refreshing

change of pace these last two days (at least for me) from a hectic week

when we had hawks flying in every cardinal direction. However, I think

we're all ready to go back to having the birds zipping past and keeping

us awake! The sky today was a rapid shape-shifter, alternating from clear

to overcast in the morning in a span of about 45 minutes, with some nice

cirrus clouds for a few hours. Most of the hawks did not come up until

after that overcast bit cleared around 10am. Hope everyone has a good

weekend. Today's count:

Oct. 7.........[season total]

3 Black Vulture................[64]

9 Turkey Vulture.............[56]

0 Osprey..........................[32]

0 Swallow-tailed Kite.....[51]

0 Mississippi Kite........[2970]

1 White-tailed Kite.........[10]

0 Bald Eagle..................[2]

2 Northern Harrier.........[220]

18 Sharp-shinned Hawk.....[3042]

9 Cooper's Hawk..............[624]

0 Red-shouldered Hawk.....[24]

43 Broad-winged Hawk....[29,480]

0 Swainson's Hawk.......[26]

0 White-tailed Hawk.......[1]

0 Red-tailed Hawk.........[31]

0 Ferruginous Hawk.......[2]

0 Crested Caracara.......[2]

23 American Kestrel........[1104]

0 Merlin.............................[31]

0 Peregrine Falcon..........[61]

1 Unidentified Accipiter....[60]

0 Unidentified buteo........[17]

0 Unidentified falcon......[7]

1 Unidentified raptor.......[68]

109 Total Hawks

Until tomorrow,

Kyle McCarty

Official counter

Smith Point Hawk Watch is made possible by donations from Exxon,

Hawkwatch International, Houston O.G., Gulf Coast Bird Observatory, and

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

Computer donated by Texas Partners in Flight and Compaq. Thank you all.