Owls, and Crossbills, and Hawks, OH MY!

My regular birding report has really been lagging behind and it's my own fault. I hope my "Creepy Bird of the Week" series is a good filler, it's certainly fun for me to dig up the ugliest birds I can find.

I've been out birding a lot since my last report, even finding some new areas to explore that have yielded interesting sightings. A few weeks ago I was looking for Green-winged Teal in a new area I had been exploring for several days in a row. There are pools of water throughout this area and the water is brackish there with pockets of sun shining through the dense forest like spotlights, which makes the teals look like the are in black water. It's a very neat look, and I had shot a hen in that water which turned out really great. So I went back to try to get the drake in that same type of scene. Well, in my search for Teal, I heard a Robin giving off some alarm chirps perched on a branch