Cooper's Hawk

Look for

A medium-sized, long-tailed accipiter with short rounded wings, dark rufous horizontal barring on the chest, gray-blue back and crown, red eye (on adults; yellow on juveniles). The tail has a clean white terminal band.

Flight: short wingbeats, then a glide — "flap-flap-glide" rhythm — while crashing through tree branches in a song-bird chase.

Size: ~16" — between Sharp-shinned Hawk (smaller) and Red-shouldered Hawk (bigger). Female noticeably larger than male.

Listen for

• Call: a rapid "cak-cak-cak-cak" — harsh, loud, often given near the nest.
• Otherwise mostly silent.

Where in Memphis

The backyard-feeder terror. Cooper's Hawks are urban specialists now — they thrive in Memphis neighborhoods hunting the bird-feeder crowd.

• Backyards with feeders — they perch nearby, wait, ambush.
• Overton Park, Shelby Farms, cemeteries
• Anywhere with mature trees + songbirds

Year-round resident. Winter numbers swell with northern migrants.

Behavior

• Ambush hunter. Sits motionless in cover, then explodes out to grab a dove, jay, or cardinal mid-flight.
• Crashes through brush during chases — can bruise its own wings on twigs.
• Specializes in birds — ~85% of diet is other birds. Very occasional squirrels.
• Nest in tall trees 30–60 ft up, often reused pairs of years.

Story

The backyard-feeder hawk

If songbirds suddenly scatter from your feeder and fall completely silent, a Cooper's Hawk is in the neighborhood. Often you'll see one land in a nearby tree seconds later. Memphis feeders lose doves, jays, cardinals, and sometimes mourning doves to Coopers all year.

Backyard-birders have mixed feelings — this is what apex predators do, and it's often the only way people see one up close.

Range expansion into cities

Cooper's Hawks were once mostly forest birds. Over the past 40 years, they've expanded into suburbs and cities, exploiting the bird-feeder boom. The Memphis metro population is higher than ever.

"Big blue darter"

Old Southern folk name. Accipiters are the "darters" — agile bird-hunters distinguished from buteos (Red-tail) and falcons.

Sharp-shinned vs Cooper's confusion

The Sharp-shinned Hawk is a nearly-identical smaller cousin. Key differences:

• Cooper's: larger, longer tail, squarer head, more deliberate flight
• Sharp-shinned: smaller (jay-sized), shorter tail, rounder head, flicking wingbeats

This is one of birding's classic ID puzzles.

Fun facts

• Female is ~30% larger than male — extreme size difference in raptors.
• They can thread through thick brush at 30 mph during chases.
• Oldest known wild Cooper's Hawk: 20+ years.
• Named for William Cooper, 19th-century American naturalist.
• They've learned to hunt around humans — some Memphis Coopers tolerate gardeners and kids within feet.