Raptorful morning

My drive to work is rather long each day because I have to first go from East Jahbib where we live, to downtown State College, then back up to Bellefonte. Some of the drive is two-way two-lane, but a lot of it is divided highway. Every morning along these roads I can expect to see at least two or three kinds of raptors. Today, however, was a truly raptorful morning! I saw

American Kestrel
Golden Eagle (HUGE!)
Red-tailed Hawk
Red-shouldered Hawk
Northern Harrier
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk

What a great day! But don't tell Kat, because she hates it when I bird while driving down the highway at about 70mph! Still, I wanted to get a photo of at least one of these guys, so I tried to pull over a couple of times but each time I spooked the bird with my 70-to-zero, slam on the brakes and pull over past that loud-ass rumble-strip on the side of the highway. Dangit! I would've had an amazing shot of the red-shouldered; he was in almost the same spot as the one I saw a couple of days ago--same bird, maybe?

Still--I'm so glad I attended that raptor ID workshop and that I spent so much time around raptor expert Susan Gets Native in Cape May. Otherwise, I would've missed most of these! The Golden Eagle was especially striking, sitting at the very tip-top of a tall snag near the highway. He was enormous. I read that they migrate through here, and just this morning I saw a posting on the listserv that someone had seen a golden near downtown. Perhaps this was the same bird?

I also saw a big flock of ducks (couldn't tell what kind) overhead. I sure do love ducks and geese. And raptors.