Hawk that Scared Me Silly!!!

Hawk in the Audubon II
Originally uploaded by mightyquinninwky©™

This hawk found a way to make me jump higher than I ever have. I was on the edge of the John James Audubon state park trying to get a good pic of a "Red Bellied" woodpecker, when some noise scared the bird away. I was annoyed, but decided to move a little further in and try and find a good spot to find him/her or another one. Little did I realize there was a raccoon in the tree over my shoulder, I never notice him though. The reason I knew he was there was a hawk out of the blue decided he/she was small enough for dinner. He/she dove down, hit the raccoon, and broke its neck, I had no clue what was going on and the noise was intense from this epic battle (ok it wasn't a battle, I am sure the raccoon was as aware of the hawk as I was of both of them!!). I nearly had a heart attack, I had just recently heard of a man that was hit by a bullet from a stray shot of a .22 and that was the first thing that went through my paranoid head, and the next thing was why is the hawk just sitting here eating. I guess when your hungry matters don't matter =)...anyway he stayed and let me photograph him while he had dinner and then nonchalantly flew off. Made for a very exciting day out in the wilderness, very exciting indeed!!