Meant to post this earlier.  Last Friday morning, the 9th, we watched for almost two hours as a hawk calmly devoured a hapless blue jay underneath a feeder we hang from an apple tree.  We don't have a decent camera but were able to spend a good bit of time with binoculars and scope watching the event.  Based on white speckles on the scapulars, we tentatively identified the culprit as a juvenile red tail. But Cynthia Crawford's post and pictures this morning sent us back to our guides and field notes.  Based on a closer reading of bird behavior and feeding habits and a review of our field notes, we now believe what we saw was a juvenile Cooper's Hawk, particularly given that one mark we noted clearly was that the tip of its bill was dark, almost black.  The only remaining doubt is that the tail of the bird we saw didn't look as long as the guides indicate for the Cooper's. But Cynthia's pictures resemble the bird we saw and, bowing to her superior expertise, we'll revise our log.  We need to get a decent camera!

Either way it was a dramatic event. Nothing left at the end of the meal but a few feathers — not even a stray bone. Felt bad eating breakfast while this was going on outside the window, but the  chickadees continued to frequent the feeder during the latter part of the feast, so we weren't alone.

This listserv is enormously useful for those of us who are what might charitably be called "emerging birders."  Thanks to those who post to it and maintain it.