Bronzed Cowbirds are scarce in southeast Arizona in the dead of winter, but there are always a few here and there at such favored sites as the Benson sewage ponds or the University of Arizona farms here in Tucson. The icterid flock at Lakeside Park had at least three individuals on Saturday, huddled in the trees or patrolling the chilly lawns with the abundant Brewer’s and Red-winged Blackbirds, Great-tailed Grackles, and Brown-headed Cowbirds.

Seen yesterday in Tucson, in the loose company of Common Goldeneye, Western Bluebird, and Cassin’s Finch.

Like most quizzes, it’s easy once you know what it is.

Aha, it does have a head! This Prairie Falcon was intimidating every bird in sight from its perch high above Tucson’s Reid Park. I had been tracking down an audible Acorn Woodpecker–a decent rarity in southeast Arizona’s lowlands–when the big falcon swooped in low, scattering everything with feathers and silencing even the noisy picid.

Identifying the bird wasn’t hard, in flight or in this perched view, but it might have been a little bit more challenging without a look at the head.

Even then, though, I think the rather long, tapered tail and long, sharp wingtip–along withe slender toes–made the determination of genus easy. And there’s no other falcon in southeast Arizona that is this white beneath. If you look closely, you’ll see that the sides of the lower breast are distinctly dark, a sort of “spillover” of this species’ distinctive blackish axillars.