
Every fall, the entire North American population of Broad-winged Hawks fill the sky in what is often called “a river of raptors” as they journey thousands of miles to their wintering grounds in South America. In 2012 and 2013, however, monitoring data suggested a population decline of 10 to 40% in some Eastern states. The next year, to better understand the threats to this forest-nesting raptor, biologists at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in Pennsylvania began tagging adult and juvenile birds with transmitters to track them year-round. Dr. Laurie Goodrich, Director of Conservation Science at the sanctuary, will join us to discuss what’s been discovered about the bird’s migration patterns, stopover habits, nesting behavior, and other data that can help set conservation priorities for this species.