EPOW - Ecology Picture of the Week

Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis), Family Accipitridae
John Day River, eastern Oregon, USA

Explanation:  Posing on a fence along a river pasture is this beautiful adult Red-tailed Hawk, a common raptor of western North America.  

Steller's Jays sometimes imitate the cry of a Red-tailed Hawk, perhaps as a means of exerting territoriality over rival jays.  (For some reason, though Steller's Jays often put a little "flip" at the end of the cry, belying their identity, at least to savvy birders.) 

In a twist of convergent behavior, in eastern North America, Blue Jays often imitate the cry of Red-shouldered Hawks that inhabit eastern forests, probably for a similar purpose.  

These convergent behaviors probably arose independently and demonstrate how nature sometimes comes up with very similar solutions to common problems.  It makes one wonder what convergent behaviors we may one day find in life forms beyond our planet...