Buteo platypterus
Order Accipitriformes
Family Accipitridae
Subfamily Accipitrinae
Adult.— Upper parts dark brown; tail dark, crossed by two to four broad bands of light gray or whitish, which show from below; under sides of quill-feathers white, tipped with black; under parts brownish, spotted with white.
Immature. — Upper parts dark brown; tail duller, with fainter bars; cheeks with rather distinct dusky streaks or “mustaches”; under parts white or buffy, heavily streaked with black.
Nest, in trees, from twenty-five to fifty feet up.
Eggs, buffy whitish, spotted with brown.
The Broad-winged Hawk is a summer resident of New York and New England. In some parts of northern New England it is the commonest hawk, but it is rare or absent in many localities. It arrives in April, and leaves in September. It is a bird of wooded hills, and disappears if the country is cleared.
If a student has become familiar with the commoner hawks, and can recognize a Buteo by the cut of the wings and tail, he may hope under favorable conditions to identify a Broad-winged Hawk. It is decidedly smaller than a Red-shouldered Hawk, and has in the breeding season a cry that resembles the note of the Wood Pewee. It is the most unsuspicious of our hawks, especially about the nest. In the adult the dark bars across the tail show distinctly from below; a large part of the under side of the wings when spread is white without any barring, and offers a marked contrast to the black tips.
Hoffmann – A Guide to the Birds of New England and Eastern New York (1904)