Great find! My quick impression is a Prairie Falcon. It does not seem chunky enough for a Gyr. Face pattern looks more like a Prairie with the white behind the mustache. I can't tell the color. It may be too gray for a Prairie. But, I have to admit that I have not seen enough of either bird. Steve Weston On Quigley Lake in Eagan, MN [log in to unmask] On Mon, Nov 2, 2015 at 9:12 PM, Josh Wallestad <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Today, 2 November, as I traveled west on Kandiyohi CR 19, there was a large > raptor perched on a pole. Initially I thought it was just one of the > ubiquitous Red-tailed Hawks in the area, but as I drove by, the GISS for > Red-tail was off, way off. I stopped to take a look. I was struck by the > heavy streaking on the breast. Coupled with the bird's large size, I > thought I might be dealing with a juvenile Northern Goshawk, so I proceeded > to take lots of photos. I looked at my photos and compared them to photos > of juvenile Goshawks, and they weren't a match. Then it dawned on me that > the face looked kind of like a Peregrine Falcon. I just assumed it was a > juvenile Peregrine (the most probable) and posted it as such in the Facbook > Group, MN Heartland Birding+. Bob Dunlap questioned me on the bird's size > because he was not getting a Peregrine impression and said the gray cheek > and weak mustache was leading him toward the Gyrfalcon. > > I posted all of my uncropped photos on a separate page on my blog, A Boy > Who Cried Heron. You can access that page and the photos by clicking this > direct link: > > http://www.aboywhocriedheron.com/falcon-photos/ > > Gyr had not even entered my mind as a remote possibility. If it had, I > would have worked for more photos and better photos. Regarding the > behavior of the bird, it never flushed during the three or four times I > drove by it and stopped to take pictures. I came back out about 45 minutes > later, and the bird was not there. This was about 3 miles east of US 71, > just SE of Willmar. > > I'd love for some experts to weigh in on this. > > Josh Wallestad > > ---- > Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net > Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html > ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html