As my wife and I were driving from our apartment to downtown Davis, today, we watched two adult, light-morph Swainson’s Hawks diving and chasing each other over I-80. They were not acting especially aggressively towards each other, but rather were flying after one another in a more playful manner. At one point, in the midst of their swooping and diving, they both gained a fair bit of altitude, flew straight toward each other, and locked talons! They began to fall and spin directly toward the streaming highway traffic below. For a brief moment, I thought I was about to witness a tragic crash, but then separated well before they actually got down to car and truck level.
I have only rarely seen this talon grappling behavior before, and never done by a pair of Swainson’s Hawks. It was very dramatic! This is usually done by birds of prey during the courtship period when two birds are setting up a territory and settling on each other to have babies with this year. Late June is not when this kind of thing would be expected seeing as most all the birds are now in the hatching eggs stage of the breeding season. However, just like humans, raptor pairs occasionally take a few moments out of their busy days to spend some quality time with each other. This time serves to reenforce and strengthen their pair-bond, and may contribute to higher rates of nest success.
So, take a few moments, find your sweetheart, and reenforce your pair bond…and by that I mean that you should lock talons together and spin a little!
abirdingnaturalist 
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