They won't like go full on (i.e to embed like you say) but will do the glancing hits which will hurt for sure.
Nice to see my friend Nilgiri is knowledgeable about raptors.
Don't get me going ohps, too late!
I've worked and volunteered with the Audubon Society for 25 years and still do on a lesser capacity, specifically with raptors. i also have several friends who are falconers (mostly down in Cape Cod) whom I trek along every once in a while in the fall on their flying and hunting trips. These guys are flying Harris hawks, Goshawks and of course Red Tails & Peregrines. One of my favorites is Ava, a 20 year-old female Goshawk that is almost bigger than a female redtail. She has the hunting prowess of an F-16. An Amazing bird and her friend Peety (Harris Hawk) is almost never tethered. He follows us from tree to tree and even follows the car back home. It's amazing to see these wild but trained animals have such a bond, albeit a controversial one for the environmental purist.
I've also worked at banding stations for many years and caught many different species of raptors and banded them etc. And as far as goshawks attacking you, you're right, they actually fist up and knock you on the head! The problem is that one of the three, forward talons can easily hang a bit low and clip you really good.
You know that there's actually 2 documented cases (this is information as of about 10 or 15 years ago so it might've changed now) of birds having killed humans. One is by a great blue heron that a biologist was handling and he let go of the neck for a split second and it jabbed him right through one of his eyes and punctured through into his brain. Very freaky. The other was a hiker who was hiking close to a great-horned owl's nest and came too close only to have the owl silently come at him from behind and grabbed him by the neck, puncturing his jugular vein. He fought the owl off and tried to contain the bleeding but by the time he reached any help and told them what happened, he lost too much blood and ended up dying. Imagine an owl puncturing your jugular? Great horned owls are incredible hunters.
We got a call from an old lady who owned a huge estate that had 75 acres of pure, white pine forest and she was complaining that some "birds" were attacking her and her driver whenever they were getting in and out of the car. This happened many years ago and it was springtime. So my friend Norman knew exactly what it was and we went out looking for these goshawks (since it had them written all over it) and sure enough, there was a nest and the male was very aggressively protecting the nest's territory to the point he was attacking them coming out of their mansion and getting into the car lol. We hiked the forest, found the nest, set up shop, my friend Norman climbed the tree to retrieve the 3 chicks to band them so that falconers won't be able to take them (only falconers are allowed to take goshawk chicks straight out of the nest unless they're banded and registered) and he wore a hardhat and a heavy, leather jacket while he was climbing the tree. The female must've buzzed him 20+ times and you can hear the whacks on the hardhat many times as she tried smacking him. It was really something to see.
Brahminy Kites (in Asia) are notorious for doing that too....I think most raptors of this size tend to do it given they are in that size range where they are big enough that they can do it but not that big enough like say Eagles etc where they carry a natural deterrence by sheer size (though Eagles and even some hawks will target bears etc similarly).
Indeed. Accipiters are generally very high-strung birds while Buteos not so much. Falcons are probably the least stressed of all. I was in an aviary returning a redtailed hawk and I put her on her perch and turned around to exit the aviary when I decided to turn around and be sure she was still on there and wasn't going to flee once I opened the door and what do you know, she was about 2ft off the ground gliding towards the back of my legs with her talons completely forward! Freaked me out! I jumped faster than I ever did in my life. And she was actually a very docile bird that I handled many times before and never had a problem with her. This time, for some reason she was pissed off that I was in her territory or her sexual maturity had peaked and was going through something. One of many fun stories from all these great experiences with these magnificent creatures.
This is my friend Norman who goes to Logan International Airport and catches all the snowy owls that come there in the winter and hang around because of the abundance of prey. This was this past February where he caught 4 the night before and we were releasing them the next day, further away from the airport at Duxbury Beach. This is a young female and look at that incredible white. Spectacular bird and what a hunter! We've seen one take down a great blue heron and another kill a peregrine in mid air! Talk about one of the ultimate hunters.
Notice the transmitter antenna behind her head?
So my driver's license expires in 2 weeks and my passport has expired. Tried to get it done on the RMV website...sorry no dice..new ID laws...you have to come in...to the RMV..oh god...the RMV..no....ugh!!! Haven't been there in a long long time.
Needless to say when I arrived the line was snaking out the door with 200 people outside and another 200 inside. Day basically ruined.
Got the "Real ID" version. Will get in the mail in <5 days...oh yay.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_ID_Act
Yeah you can't board a plane with the old ones now. I got mine in February but I'm not sure it's the new one like yours because I think that new law came out a bit after if I'm not mistaken. Gotta check.
