Gophers Related Topics 
10,000 Birds
DECEMBER 2, 2011
I’ve seen young Red-tailed Hawk s who just don’t have the hang of it, counting on luck of good fortune to present them with a careless gopher or a rare easy meal. On this occasion Patch had secured a gopher and was dining on a streetlight. Patch was focused and deliberate, consistent and inventive. She had remembered.
10,000 Birds
NOVEMBER 18, 2011
Here Patch sits on a bench watching a pocket gopher tidy up the front of its burrow. Here she is carrying a squirming gopher over the heads of park-goers who actually notice the spectacle. She understood the threat of large ravens, and yet would fly three feet off the ground through intersections. Another strange encounter.
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10,000 Birds
MAY 11, 2012
They know the rhythms of gophers. They share our world without too much complaint, adapting to our cities and towns when they can. They mimic our styles of dress and mock us through forced perspective. They are good watchers. They know the rhythms of traffic. Males can get into a dance battle if territories are threatened.
10,000 Birds
MAY 25, 2012
An intimate moment at dusk between a Red-tailed Hawk and an expired gopher. Baby Red-shouldered Hawk puts on its game face after falling from the nest. Northern Harrier bristling rictally. Black-headed Grosbeak unkempt in the rain. Sharp-shinned Hawk slowly getting blood-red angry. It takes them 4-5 years to become furious. Wild Turkey.
10,000 Birds
AUGUST 31, 2012
Gophers that live near streetlights beware. Next time you find the light fading and resign yourself to a night sky filled with owls and bats, remember that some diurnal denizens like to stay out late too. Red-tailed Hawks have a habit of hunting well into the night if there is any available light and the getting is good.
10,000 Birds
MAY 31, 2015
No “gophers” etc. I can’t think of many sights more entertaining than a red fox scouting a meadow in search of mice – or gophers, voles, gerbils – well, mice in a German sense. In German, if you are a rodent and you are smaller than – say – a human hand, you’re a mouse.
10,000 Birds
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
The hawk was intent on finding gophers and I used its focus to my advantage and closed the distance gradually. It was actively hunting the grassy slopes and barely paid me any attention as I tried to figure out how to get as close as possible without changing its behavior.
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