Hi Everybody,

George Jett asked:
> Are Shrikes raptors?

Well...no, mostly because to Linnaeus and his students who codified early
avian taxonomy they were self evident songbirds due to their foot structure.
Shrikes have been called "raptorial songbirds" and "honorary raptors" by
some.

> What about crows and jays?

The same point about early bird taxonomy applies to the Corvids. Besides in
folk taxonomy, going back to the dawn of awareness that there were different
kinds of birds, crows and jays always had their special niche in folklore.
Personally I might accord the Common Raven a special place among the raptors
if not for its unique status as King of the Avian Tricksters.

> "It ain't over until it is over" - C.S.  It's over!

Actually that quote goes to another Yankee, the great philosopher of home
plate Mr. Lawrence Peter Berra. I suspect Casey had some influence on Yogi,
and vice versa.

 Johanna Robinson asked:
>Do New World vultures have grasping talons?  Do Old World vultures?

I deliberately left myself open on this one for the sake of further
discussion, Cathartids (New Worlders) have a chicken-like foot structure,
not really taloned. Old World Vultures have essentially the same
foot-structure as other Accipitrids (hawks, eagles, etc.). The talons are a
bit less curved and the foot less strong. Campbell and Lack (in "A
Dictionary of Birds") state: "Like all birds of prey, the vultures have
powerful bills with hooked tips, but their feet and claws are alleged to be
comparatively weak (a fact which is not always apparent to those who have
handled them)." Note that if taxonomy were the rule for defining raptor we'd
have to count Old World vultures and exclude New World vultures in spite of
their considerable ecological similarities.

Counting vultures on North American hawk watches boils down to tradition, as
George aptly noted in his first reply. New World vultures have been
considered raptors since the time of Linnaeus and have always beeen included
on hawk watch forms and counted by hawk watchers. As far as I know, the Hawk
Migration Association of North America still incudes them on their forms.
The Fort Smallwood Hawk Watch would have much less impressive totals if
vultures were excluded from their tallies, especially early in the season.

Here's to Lively Discussion of Arbitrary Terminology,

Walter Ellison

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