Loggerhead Shrike

Description:

The head and back are grey and the underparts white. The wings and tail are black, with white patches on the wings and white on the outer tail feather. The black face mask extends over the bill, unlike that of the similar but slightly larger Northern Shrike. The Loggerhead Shrike hardly appears to be a predator. But it uses its hooked beak to kill insects, lizards, mice, and birds, and then impales them on thorns to hold them while it rips them apart.

Habitat:

On our first stop at a fishing jetty on our trip through Sabine National Wildlife Refuge, LA. we spotted this small raptor in the tree.

Notes:

Sabine NWR,about 8 miles south of Hackberry, on State Highway 27, was established in 1937 to provide habitat for migratory waterfowl and other birds. The refuge consists of a basin of wetlands located between the Gulf's beach cheniers (oak ridges)and the coastal prairie, which is one of the most productive and fertile areas of North America. It encompasses 124,511 acres of fresh,intermediate and brackish marshes and is one of the largest estuarine-dependent marine species nurseries in southwest Louisiana. It has also been designated as an "Internationally Important Bird Area" due to the numerous wading, water and marsh birds that utilize it throughout the year.