Northern goshawk
Accipiter gentilis
Identification Tips:
- Length: 19 inches Wingspan: 42 inches
- Sexes similar, but females much larger
- Medium-sized, broad-winged, long-tailed hawk
- Short, dark, hooked beak
- Rounded wings
- Long tail rounded at tip
- Flies with several flaps and short glide, also soars frequently
- Short, dark, hooked beak
- Long, very thick tarsi appear short at rest
Adult:
- Red eye
- Blackish head and face with bold white supercilium
- Gray back and upperwings
- Pale gray chin, throat, breast, underwing coverts and belly finely vermiculate
- White undertail coverts
- Tail dark blue-gray above and pale below, barred with dark bands
- Flight feathers dark blue-gray above and pale below, barred with black
Immature:
- Yellow eye
- Brown head with bold white supercilium
- Brown back and upperwings
- White belly boldly streaked with black to undertail coverts
- Tail, brown above and pale below, marked by jagged bars edged narrowly in whit
Similar species:
Adults unmistakable when seen well; at a distance, Goshawks distinctively
combine the large size of a buteo and the broad-winged, long-tailed shape and
quick wingbeats of accipiters. Immature Northern Goshawks are similar in
shape and patterning to immature Cooper's, but are much larger, with
proportionately shorter tails, bulkier bodies and thicker black streaking
extending all the way to the undertail coverts. Sharp-shinned Hawks are
typically much smaller, with shorter, squared-off tails and shorter heads
that do not project as far when flying. Immature Red-shouldered Hawk has pale
crescents in the wing and a shorter tail.
Length and wingspan from: Robbins, C.S., Bruun, B., Zim, H.S., (1966). Birds of North America. New York: Western Publishing Company, Inc.