It’s 10:00PM as I type this update. I was home from this morning’s Hawking when I got the call around 5:00PM that one of the Hawk babies had fledged so I rushed back to the park.
The fledgling was hanging out on Bobst Library roof when I arrived. It walked, ran, and exercised its wings a bit during the 2 hours it was on the roof. It then flew to Silver and then to the building across the street from Silver.
The baby that was still in the nest did a lot of jump-flapping and flying on the ledge but didn’t leave tonight.
I never saw the other Hawk baby this morning during my earlier visit so a fellow Hawk-watcher and I now think the fledgling had left the nest either before we got to the park this morning or late yesterday after we had left (and that to think the amorphous dark shape seen further back on the ledge this morning as the other baby was a mistake).
There was lots of action when I returned to the park this afternoon. I’ll go through my photos and post them in the morning so stay tuned for an update to this post.
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Morning update. I’m going to include precise timestamps in order to better show how things transpired last night.
Bobby brought food to the nestling at 5:44PM:
Sadie rushed to the nest:
Bobby left the nest within a minute:
He landed on the corner of Silver above me:
Sadie left the nest 7 minutes later:
The baby ate then made its way to the right-hand corner of the ledge.
Bobby flew back to the nest at 6:48 with Sadie right behind him:
Bobby took a bit of food from the nest a couple of minutes later. You can see the baby’s head peeking up on the right:
He took the food across the street. It might have partially been a luring tactic to draw the other baby out of the nest.
Sadie remained in the nest for several more minutes.
The fledgling finally showed itself again.
7:14PM:
Sadie made a couple of close fly-bys at the fledgling.
7:25PM:
We took her interaction to mean she was trying to get it off the roof and fly to a less vulnerable spot. A large bird had flown a bit close over the fledgling minutes earlier but I couldn’t determine if it was a Seagull or a Peregrine. I’m leaning toward Peregrine since its wings were broader than a gull’s. Unfortunately I didn’t get a great shot of the bird.
Regardless, the fledgling did fly toward Sadie at 7:39PM. It was trying to land on Silver, right over our heads, but couldn’t get footing and started to freefall:
It quickly righted itself and flew to the building across from Silver:
Sadie followed it to the building top instantly. She then circled low above the building, calling out loudly. Her piercing call made passersby stop and look up at her.
Sadie landed on a water tower atop Silver. She had a perfect view of the fledgling and the nest from her vantage point.
Unfortunately we could not see the fledgling from the street despite trying many different angles from the park.
It was getting dark and the nest baby was amped up with its jump-flapping and running on the ledge.
We were lucky to be able to watch Sadie’s reflection and keep an eye on her as we watched the nest. Photo from 8:12PM:
Bobby had been on One Fifth Avenue for at least an hour at this point. He then made a couple of very close fly-bys right outside the nest a couple of times.
8:29PM (seconds before sunset):
It was much too dark for the baby to fledge.
Sadie jumped off the water tower and landed a little further down on Silver at 8:36PM. I heard a terrible high-pitched shrieking. Sadie then jumped off the building and flew further down the roofline with a rodent in tow. She had hunted and caught the rodent on the roof!
I lightened these photos to show the details. In reality it was quite dark outside.
She flew further east at 8:38PM. I don’t think she had the rodent with her so she might have either gulped it down or left the body on the corner.
