Urban Hawks

April 7, 2011December 25, 2020Washington Sq. Red-tailed Hawks

Washington Square

After years of juvenile hawks, and last year’s pair of unsuccessful nesters, this year Washington Square finally has an active nest with three eggs. The nest is on a window ledge of Dr. John Sexton’s office, President of the university, at N.Y.U.’s Bobst Library. This location continues the pattern of hawks in Manhattan finding spectacular places to build nests.

The library is on the south east corner of Washington Square on West 4th Street. The nest is on the side of the building that faces the park, on the top floor, the second window from the west.

The New York Times had a nice feature on the nest yesterday, and has set up a webcam to view the nest. The streaming feed is on Livestream.com, which also provides applications for the iPhone and iPad. If you use these applications, search for NYT Hawk Cam.

The mobile feed is exciting since it will allow hawk watchers to go to the park, and get a webcam view of the nest on their mobile devices, while simultaneously watching the other parent off the nest.

The ledge the nest sits on is fairly deep, so the brooding female is usually hidden from the street. But if all goes well and the eggs hatch, the eyasses will be easy to see after three or four weeks.

My video and photographs from the park perspective on Thursday evening are below.

April 5, 2011December 25, 2020927 5th Avenue Red-tailed Hawks

A Rainbow

As I came into the park, there was a wonderful rainbow over the east side. Later, I followed the the dark female fron the “Woody” building to the Beresford Apartments. In Lola’s favorite spot, it was like seeing a ghost.

April 4, 2011December 25, 2020Riverside Park Red-tailed Hawks

Patience at Riverside

Watching a hawk sitting on a nest takes patience! Tonight, at the Riverside Park nest near the Boat Basin, it took lots of patience. The female sat on the nest and almost nothing happened. All of this is a good sign, but it makes for a dull evening.

April 3, 2011December 17, 2020927 5th Avenue Red-tailed Hawks

Late Afternoon on Sunday

Sunday at Fifth Avenue seemed to be just like the last few days. The only surprise was Pale Male’s roosting location, north of the Met! He was on the Jackie O building before roosting.

April 2, 2011December 25, 2020927 5th Avenue Red-tailed Hawks

Saturday On Fifth Avenue

On Friday, I posted a request for information about what triggers ovulation in a female hawk and what the logical time frame would be for the Dark Female to lay eggs.

Katherine Herzog and Pamela Langford offered some excellent insights.

Katherine reminded me that Pale Male and Lola usually started courting behavior around mid-February and nested in early-March, so they had about a four week window.

Pamela asked a biologist for my question. The answer was that scientists don’t know all of the variables. Certainly, time of year/daylight and food supply play a large part, but scientists also know other factors such as behavior play a part. (Even less is known about what triggers a second clutch, when things go wrong!)

So, given all of what I know so far, I only think I can say that we shouldn’t be concerned if this new female takes up to four weeks to lay eggs or somewhere around April 22nd. I could however be much shorter. Bets anyone?

Saturday was typical of what has become the normal pattern at the nest. Copulation, a shared late afternoon meal, chasing an intruder Red-tailed Hawk (whose identity is a mystery), and lots of nest visits primarily at this point by Pale Male.

March 29, 2011December 25, 2020927 5th Avenue Red-tailed Hawks

More NC-17

The dark female and Pale Male continue to cement their relationship, as the photos below show.

In the surprise that partners had switched yet again last week, I assumed that this new female was the Dec./Jan. mate based on my memory of how she looked. I went back to old photographs tonight and video, and the hawks from the two periods are a close match. But a perfect match? I can’t say for sure.