PVAS sponsored a trip to the Washington Monument Hawk Watch. Beautiful weather, with light winds from the southeast. We had the following raptors, not counting the vultures:

38 Sharp-shinned Hawks
4 Coopers Hawks
1 Northern Harrier
2 Red-shouldered Hawks
6 migrating Red-tailed Hawks
4 Merlins

Three of the Merlins hung around the monument for 10-15 minutes, thrilling us with their acrobatics and stooping behavior. Their usual harassing behavior was on display. They also perched for long periods, allowing everyone to have great opportunities to observe this powerful raptor both in the air and on the perch. At one point, a perched Merlin was chased off perch by 2 Common Ravens.

Our observations belied the saying that if you have a good look at a Merlin, it probably was not a Merlin.

Sandy Sagalkin
Sharpsburg, MD

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