id this bird

rudely awoken out of bed by, i suspected, odo, between 3 & 4 in the a.m., i stand corrected this afternoon. i heard knocking against the side of the house. apparently, odo had turned on the motion sensitive spot lights. i only looked out the window to see a flash of something moving for a second. but i continued to hear banging against the house, on the roof and against the awnings. i didn't want to go outside to disturb anyone's dinner, so once things quieted down, i settled back to sleep.

just now i went outside to investigate. preferring ground dwelling, odo had been sleeping by the bottle palms. i didn't see him but i saw vegetation move when he took off. also this time i heard his wings flapping or hitting the vegetation on ascent. odo landed again on the electric line, not far from where he was feeding early this morning.

martha, should you ever get to south florida, i owe you lunch. odo is no owl. odo is indeed my first nighthawk. and he is wonderful. today he let me get a little closer. for the first time we met eye to eye, maybe 15-20 feet away. but as soon as i tried to take another step he took off and again disappeared into the other side of the garden. and i mean disappeared. i watched to where he flew but could not again find him. odo is a little like love. alluring but elusive. captivating but never caught. odo has made his home, however temporary, however long, within the boundries of this garden, but here he is free.

intoducing odo. odo, this is everybody; everybody, here is odo:
img_750412_0_4dabf6562566bb4b711e565287576fed.jpg


img_750412_1_b2607ecbfda074da3a38e497dc77ec43.jpg
 
thanx martha. i was pleased to finally get a clear view.

meanwhile
Occasionally single birds may be found overwintering. The nighthawk is also occasionally found as a vagrant to the US Gulf Coast states to Florida
Click to expand...
source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesser_Nighthawk

see, first that aggressive bum at the supermarket and now a vagrant in my own garden. obviously a sign of the times.
 
whipperwhill(sp?) is the bird in the first 2-3 photos. Night bird. Distinctive call at sunset
and sunrise.
 
Not a Lesser Nighthawk if he's in FL. They're western birds. I was thinking Whippoorwill too, because of the lack of the bars on the wings. Could also be a Chuck-will's widow. Have you heard the call?

Here's a good site for identifying. Has the range maps and the calls, both of which are helpful. Chuck-will's-widow - Whatbird.com
 
There are nighthawks in Florida, e.g. the common nighthawk. Lazy said silent and that whip-poor-will song is sure is distinctive. They are the same genus aren't they?

Lazy, do you know the sound of a whip-poor-will? It would be quite loud and rhythmic, starting after dark. Sounds like the name.
 
Last edited:
Martha said:
There are nighthawks in Florida, e.g. the common nighthawk. Lazy said silent and that whip-poor-will song is sure is distinctive. They are the same genus aren't they?
Click to expand...

Absolutely. But they also have those incredibly distinctive bars on the wings and tail. I have no idea what Odo is, but I'm leaning toward the Chucks Will Widow. They also have a distinct call, but look a lot like Lazy's pictures.

cwwi.jpg


chuck-wills-widow1.jpg
 
Could be, Harley. Their song is loud yes? But not as distinctive as the whip-poor-will. Lazy, you can check for song on the link I posted above.
 
harley said:
Absolutely. But they also have those incredibly distinctive bars on the wings and tail. I have no idea what Odo is, but I'm leaning toward the Chucks Will Widow. They also have a distinct call, but look a lot like Lazy's pictures. (snip)
Click to expand...

Also, they don't have a white patch on the wing, which I think you also mentioned was one of Odo's characteristics. And check out the shape of Odo's tail feathers compared to the photo of Chuck-wills-widow. Very similar, IMO. The only difference I see is the chuck-wills-widow appears to be banded or checkered on the underside of the tail feathers but Odo's appear to be more or less solid colored. Maybe he's a juvenile? Chuck-wills-widow has the right range (southeastern US, including Florida) and the description I read sounded like about the right size: 11" long, wingspan about two feet. Whippoorwills are smaller.
 
bare in mind that i've no idea what i'm doing. from all the online pics i'm sifting through, i think it is closer to harley's chuck-will's widow than it is to mike hall's whippoorwill. as far as i know, i haven't heard, odo sing yet. i'm not yet ruling out a rogue lesser nighthawk. those extra feathers of the chuck might be what i confused to be owl ears when i had trouble focusing, though it seems to me, even though i haven't gotten close enough yet to be sure, that odo has a stronger looking beak. odo, after all, is a star! i'll have to look during another one of his quick flights to see if i see a horizontal white stripe on the wing per pics i found of the chuck. kyounge, from his quick flights so far i thought i saw that the wings were solid brown, or at least not white striped. i'll have to focus on that next time to be sure. i agree that odo seems larger than descripts i've read of whippoorwills.

intestesting sound site martha. according to recordings there, the dove is certainly a eurasian collared-dove. other sounds i recognize are the osprey & little blue heron, both especially from my everglades adventures; the mourning dove of course; the great horned owl (i had two in the garden for a few months until hurricane wilma); both the northern (yellow-shafted) flicker and the red-bellied woodpecker, so now i don't know which is pictured on the pine tree this time around (probably the red-bellied though); blue jay, naturally; american crow; possibly the fish crow; carolina wren; mockingbird (one of my favorite song birds); wood thrush (and i've seen them wondering what they were); robins; red-winged blackbird; both common & boat-tailed grackles; and my cardinals.

i've listened now to the different types of nighthawks and will see if i can match odo should he break out into song. perhaps if i leave out some sheet music...

ps, check out the sound of the purple martin. way cool. this is really quite involved. someone should consider making a science of it.
 
Wow! I sure wouldn't want to be a mouse, look over my shoulder and see that coming at me!
 
t-al, those snowy owls are as gorgeous as the pic you posted. i actually almost ran into one in florida many years ago while crossing the state. don't know what he was doing here but he took my breath away. after he dive bombed the car a few times, he flew alongside me for about a half mile (seemed like miles in memory but i'm pretty sure it was just moments). was pure white and huge. i'll never forget him. just beautiful.

meanwhile, odo has settled into the garden quite nicely. i forgot about him for a moment while watering yesterday until he let his presence known. then this morning while working in the garden, i must've woken him up. odo flew out of nowhere, landing on a wooden sculpture. this time he let me nearer, i got to about 15 ft away, though, of course, i didn't have the camera with me. anyway, i've come to like odo very much and hope he stays through the winter. my tourist nighthawk.
 
We had a neighbor who got a wild chickadee to eat out of her hand.

You probably know this trick, but if you want to get close to an animal, it helps to not look at them. That is, turn your head about 90 degrees away, and look out of the corner of your eye.
 
TromboneAl said:
We had a neighbor who got a wild chickadee to eat out of her hand.

You probably know this trick, but if you want to get close to an animal, it helps to not look at them. That is, turn your head about 90 degrees away, and look out of the corner of your eye.
Click to expand...

Many years ago, I had a chickadee ('trained' by a neighbor) eat of my hand.
 
iBird Explorer

I was reading over some old messages to see if there was anything important in them and came across this software There are versions for iPhone/iPod, or Windows Mobile devices. I bet Odo is in there—the blurb says it covers all birds found in North American back yards.
 
thanx kyounge. answering the questions on your cited site id's odo as

Short-tailed Hawk - Whatbird.com



that actually looks like the other guy who comes around at the change of the season to eat a mourning dove or two. not sure that's odo though. odo doesn't have such a strong beak. just saw odo again day before yesterday. seems he's wintering here.
 
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