The Red-tailed Hawks of Washington Square Park, NYC… mostly
The same two hawks as yesterday (original Crown Building nesting hawk and ‘new?’ hawk) were soaring, perching, and fighting/courting early this afternoon. I found a sweet spot from which to photograph them relatively undisturbed by passersby. It was just me, the hawks, and the hundreds of other milling people several feet away.
‘New?’ hawk (the one with the two damaged feathers seen yesterday):
Continue to the full post… “Southeastern Central Park Red-tailed Hawk pair – March 6th, 2012”
Red-Tailed Hawk Found Dead in Central Park
The headline above links to a New York Times article referring to a Red-tailed Hawk that was found in Central Park yesterday. Now that the story is public, I feel I can now speak about it. I heard about the dead hawk yesterday from a friend and was quite worried the hawk might be one of the two hawks I’ve been recently photographing building a nest on the Crown Building. What made my worries deepen in the morning before work was not seeing any Crown Building hawk flying to or from the nest, soaring, or perched on regular nearby perches. I almost always see at least one of the above activities in the morning. I went to Central Park during lunch to seek out the pair and was relieved to see a pair soaring above the regular territory above and north of Grand Army Plaza (the same territory the Southeastern Central Park hawks fly). Neither of the hawks went to the Crown Building nest itself during my brief visit but one of the Crown Building hawks soared above Bergdorf Goodman department store and by the Solow Building.
When I first wrote this post I suggested perhaps the two hawks I saw today were either members of the original Crown Building nesting pair or one of the two hawks was a new hawk on the scene, pairing up with the recently-widowed red-tail as a potential mate. As we know from watching Bobby and Pale Male, hawks can find a new mate within hours of losing its old one to death or disappearance.
Upon looking at today’s photos in closer detail, it looks like either the two hawks I saw today were fighting or courting each other. It’s tough to tell but I heard from a more experienced hawk-watcher that courting can look like fighting at first. Both hawks have slightly tattered wings, as if they’ve had a few scuffles. One of the hawks was definitely one of the original nesting Crown Building hawks. I recognize its coloring and markings on sight. The second hawk I saw today did not look like its mate. Instead, its original mate had a more chocolatey-brown head and lighter chest coloring. The ‘new’ hawk I saw today looks more reddish on its head and on the underside of its wings (which looks more heavily-patterned than the other mate was). It’s the not knowing for sure which is troublesome.
New hawk?
Continue to the full post… “Dead Red-Tailed Hawk in Central Park may be Crown Building hawk”
