Vince Of Fordham's New Girl Would Be Hardpressed to Pick a More Dangerous Spot for Fledglings

Photo by Chris Lyons

Here is the new nest of Vince of the Fordham University Campus in the Bronx/NYBG and his New Girl.

The nest is over looking a street, as most building nests in NYC are.

This one does have a little railing to help keep the nest intact which is nice.

 Photo by Chris Lyons
What isn't nice is what the fledglings will have to clear before they get to a real tree or other green space of any note.

Photo by Chris Lyons

 Here is a note from a very concerned Chris Lyons who photographed the nest site and who has been a chief watcher this area's hawks in the Bronx for many years.

 

I hope this gives you some idea of the situation--these are all taken from inside the campus--the nest is at the far upper right-hand window of that apartment building with the fake columns on the top floor.   It's six stories up.  To safely fledge, the eyasses would have to reach this large oak on the other side of Webster--if they undershoot, they're on the street, and if they overshoot, they're on the Metro North tracks, with no way for anybody to reach them quickly.  If they end up on the ground, in the tiny sliver of parkland between Webster and the tracks--well--people who hang out there are mainly nice, but probably know nothing about hawks.  On my way to lunch, I often see this guy exercising his three playful energetic pit bulls there.  Maybe they'd just be curious if they saw a young hawk on the grass, but curiosity doesn't just kill cats.    

In one picture, you can see a bit of a tail sticking up, but I have not seen much activity thus far. (Photo directly above,tail is center in nest. DB) Most of the time, you can't see a hawk--I will explore other viewing options later on. 

So it's still weeks before we know if the eggs will hatch.  It occurs to me that if the female really likes this nest, she may not be deterred by the eggs not hatching--like all those failed attempts on 5th Ave.   My hope is that the eggs do hatch, and that it can then be arranged for the eyasses to be removed, and possibly re-released on the campus, where the parents could find them.  The NYBG probably wouldn't be a good idea, since the Great Horned Owls are there (well, one of them, and she's probably none too fond of Red-tails right about now).  

Chris is right about the NYBG not being the best option, particularly as I've gotten word that there is a male to go with the female GHO nesting there these days.

Red-tailed Hawk parents do find fledglings who "magically"
appear begging heartily in unexpected places.

"Ziggy", the fledgling of Charlotte and Pale Male Jr, who had originally been grounded on a city street during morning rush hour, was "found" by her parents after being placed in Central Park after a two week sojourn with the rehabbing Horvaths.
 
Donegal Browne 

The Hawks of Washington Square Park and Trouble Coming for the Norfolk Botanic Garden Eagles

I headed for Washington Square Park though the light was already falling behind buildings, in hope of a little luck. And indeed we had it. Immediately we found Bobby's New Girl.

She is gorgeous.

See Bobby closer to the roof.

As is common amongst Red-tail pairs perched reasonably close to each other, they are facing in different directions.

N.G. looks up and as I'm attempting to see what she's looking at, my daughter Sam calls, "There they go".











Whichever hawk it was has disappeared either onto or beyond the building.

Is that the same hawk or a different one?



And a hawk goes into the trees.

But when I get to a spot where I can see the face of the building, there is New Girl, looking towards the park and likely at her mate. A Red-tail pair at this point in the season very much attempts to remain in eye contact with each other.


New Girl is off.

Yes this is a very bad photograph but even very bad photographs can be extremely helpful as in this case. It documents that fact that N.G. now has prepared food in her talons- a gift left for her from Bobby?

Find the hawk.

Back into the park to try spotting the hawks, I meet W.S.P. hawkwatchers, Paul and Larry. We talk of Violet and remember her.

This is one of Paul's rather chubby squirrel friends. I wander a little keeping an eye peeled.

And for the NYC landmark inclined, the arch in Washington Square Park.

A squirrel tucked in for the night.

And just as I was about to call it a day, Larry, the man has amazing distance vision, pointed toward a terrace and there indeed was Bobby surveying his domain as the light continued to fade. As did I too, toward home.

AND A WISCONSIN TIDBIT


AND FROM ROBIN OF ILLINOIS CONCERNING THE NORFOLK EAGLES--She said, "I read this as Norfolk Botanical Garden folds - and as per law, they have no choice..and we all know a bit about so-called 'wildlife experts'."

From their FB page "Eagles at Norfolk Botanical Garden" "Norfolk Botanical Garden is extremely fortunate and proud to be the nesting grounds for wild eagles. The eagles have advanced our mission and taught millions the importance of environmental education while developing a loyal and caring worldwide audience of eagle watchers. This would not have been possible without the strong partnership with WVEC, VDGIF, and with special assistance from the CCB and our caring viewers. Without a doubt, everyone loves the NBG eagles and cares deeply about their safety and well-being. As you are aware, there are current discussions among several agencies regarding the nest at NBG. Concern has been expressed by these agencies about the proximity of the nesting eagles to the Norfolk International Airport and the danger that it could present to the flying public. Norfolk Botanical Garden is neither legally nor professionally in a position to take any action that would affect the bald eagles that are nesting at the Garden. We are an educational and horticultural institution that displays beautiful landscapes, maintains plant collections and provides environmental information. If and when there is any action to be taken in regard to eagles at the Garden or in the region, it will be added to the Airport’s existing Wildlife Hazard Management Plan. This plan has been in place for a number of years, as it is at all airports, and addresses animals that present a hazard to airline safety. These plans are created by wildlife experts and enforced by the appropriate government agencies. We recognize that the viewing public is strongly invested in these eagles and understand and share in your frustration with the unknown. But it is just that, unknown. As the eagle component of the Wildlife Hazard Management Plan is developed, NBG will provide further information as soon it becomes available. As I am sure you will agree, public safety and the safety of the eagles is paramount. It is the responsibility of the professionals and experts involved, or others they may deem appropriate, to develop a plan that effectively addresses and provides sound solutions to this situation." Wildlife Hazard Management Plan? It occurs to me that the planes and where humans have decided to build their airports are more of a hazard than wildlife, but then that's just me. Okay, okay, you're right, not just me but most of us who are paying attention to the state of wildlife. Here is a bit of a cautionary tale for those who are made afraid by certain self perpetuating fear spreading often just plain dumb bureaucracies. As you will no doubt note from the blog I'm now in NYC. I took a plane to get here. Unfortunately flying for humans or for eagles isn't what it used to be. For whatever reason, airport security, unless in a rather hip brainy town like Madison, Wisconsin (They unpacked the scope once. The guy in charge had everyone come over, look at it, in and out of the scan machine, and saved an image, so they'd ALL know it the next time and not waste everyone's time. This is not the norm.), can't seem to "get it" when it comes to birding scopes. This trip tops them all. This time going out of Milwaukee I was subjected to a full body scan, had my bottom patted down, my palms swabbed, and my carry on bag with the scope completely unpacked and swabbed. When asked what the scope was, I said, "It is a birding scope." A what? "It's used for magnification when bird watching." It took awhile. Therefore, I don't even wonder where in the hierarchy of importance a pair of Bald Eagles will be, the symbol of our nation no less, to the kind of people who make the decisions that name something a Wildlife Hazard Management Plan. Right there it is. Wildlife is the hazard. Just as are, 100 pound, 5 foot tall women with birding scopes. The hazard my friends is not the wildlife or those who know their worth, though they would like you to think so. The hazard is the hubris of humans who build airports in or near the few remaining pieces of wildlife friendly habitat near urban areas instead of protecting them. Not all animals are as adaptive as our beloved urban Red-tailed Hawks, but they all are just as important to a humane and stewarding life on the planet.

Donegal Browne

WHAT HAPPENED TO PALEMALE'S NEW MATE? MY THEORY OF WHY ANOTHER FEMALE IS WOOING PALE MALE

Photo courtesy of Lincoln Karim on www.palemale.com/
Many thanks also to Lincoln Karim for the primary observations of both contenders for the spot of consort to Pale Male
January 30th, 2011
Pale Male and the new, New Girl

Professional photographer and longtime and almost daily watcher of Pale Male, Lincoln Karim of palemale.com reports that Pale Male has taken up with a different female. She is a very light hawk who looks very much like Pale Male himself. If she wins The Monarch of Central Park , identification of who's who won't be a matter of a glance for hawkwatchers.

TODAY'S DISCLAIMER--
By the way, as usual, any musings I expound upon on the blog are mine and aren't to be taken as the opinions of any of the other blog contributors unless they say they are.

Sally of Kentucky, after scrutinizing Lincoln's photographs for possible differences between the two hawks, said this--

Pale Male's new friend, though very similar, seems to have no bands on her tail, a darker, less defined white "chin" with more brown stripes in it, and perhaps fatter spots on the belly band. I think he has whiter eyebrows as well.

All good differences, thanks Sally, though after looking carefully, I think in one photo I can see that the new hawk does have a very faint band on her tail, but it is pretty indistinct. People are going to have to be on their toes to catch the cues when they see one of them on the move.

And yes, the previous candidate, Ginger hasn't been seen around Pale Male for some days.

SO WHAT HAPPENED?


Photo Courtesy of www.palemale.com/
January 24th, 2011

Go to Lincoln's site, the 2011 Archives for January 24th, and look at the sequence of photographs which includes the above photo as the 13th in the progression. Then click back and read the following.

Barring some misfortune occurring within the last few days to Ginger the previous candidate for Pale Male's mate, here is what I think happened.

Late on the day of January 24, Lincoln photographed two hawks on the antenna of, I think, the Oreo building. He didn't think either Red-tail was Pale Male and neither do I.

First the back story--
Some years ago, there was a debate on original Regular and author of Red-tails In Love, Marie Winn's blog, as to just why hawks and other raptors have reverse sexual dimorphism.

To put it simply, the girls are bigger than the boys.

All the obvious things had already been scientifically discounted such as a bigger female keeps the eggs warmer and that would be a favorable adaptation. Turns out it didn't make much difference. As did any of the other things we came up with except...

I hypothesized that the females were bigger because they fought each other for the right to court an available male.

That is the accepted reason why males are bigger than females in species such as White-tailed Deer, correct? The biggest, strongest, healthiest males get all the females and make bigger, stronger, healthier babies.

Therefore my thought was, as attrition is supposedly higher in females of raptor species, and therefore need to be replaced most frequently in pairs, the biggest strongest, healthiest, and feistiest females would fight each other for the prize of an available prime male with prime territory.

It made sense to me though I didn't make total headway in convincing every last skeptic to say the least .

Since that time, I've been wondering, among many other things, why in some cases Lola was perfectly happy to allow Pale Male to run off single intruders to the territory while she sat the nest. But in other cases she'd whip off the nest like a missile, bear down on the intruder screaming and seriously chase that particular hawk away, leaving Pale Male to hot wing it to the nest and take it over. I wondered, "Are those particular intruders female?"

Ever since that debate on Marie's Blog, I've been trying to find situations and observations where my hypothesis could be tested.

First Lola disappeared, then Ginger appeared to be taking on Pale Male unchallenged. At least that's how it appeared, but during this time of year there are ever so many fewer observers than there will be once the hawks take to the nest. But that would be too late.

Then Lincoln photographed the sequence of events that could be the first documentation of the behavior that I was looking to find in Central Park, that I've heard anyway. (There was a possibly telling incident in Brooklyn that might also be documentation for the hypothesis.)

The first photograph of the antenna hawks, shows a hawk landing on the left of the antenna and the hawk I identify as Ginger is on the right. The hawks appear to be relatively the same size. Neither is noticeably smaller which Pale Male would be.

In the second and third photograph, the newly arrived left hawk, which is paler that the darker hawk on the right, takes an offensive stance and gives the hawk on the right offensive looks.

The left hawk then takes to the air and goes for the right hawk in a way I've seen hawks behave in the country when menacing a rival in a dispute.

Go to the 9th photo in the antenna sequence (or the 13th from the beginning of that size photo) Left hawk is above Right Hawk. Look at Right Hawk's belly band and head. That looks like the curve and saturation of Ginger's belly band and the darkness of her head.

Whether the hawk on the left is the new, New Girl, is quite possible or alternately it might be another female who was in on the female stramash as well.

In the 9th photo of January 30th, note the lighter eye color of the new, New Girl.

As the current consort of Pale Male is so pale herself, I looked up the synonyms for pale on Thesaurus.com . All of which it turns out, have rather negative connotations.

pale Part of Speech: adjective Definition: light in color or effect Synonyms: anemic, ashen, ashy, blanched, bleached, bloodless, cadaverous, colorless, deathlike, dim, doughy, dull, faded, faint, feeble, ghastly, gray, haggard, inadequate, ineffective, ineffectual, insubstantial, livid, lurid, pallid, pasty, poor, sallow, sick, sickly, spectral, thin, unsubstantial, wan, washed-out, waxen, waxlike, weak, white, whitish Notes: a pail is a bucket while pale means whitish in complexion or very light colored.

See what I mean?

Though I find it quite interesting that haggard which is used to identify a wild hawk also can mean "pale".

But in the meantime blog reader, Jane of Georgia, had sent an email with what she thought upon seeing the newest female--

After seeing Lincoln Karim's gorgeous pix of her, I’m suggesting we call her Pearl. As he describes her, I think she has that same warm buff, champagne color to her and that made me think of Pearl.

We love that Pale Male is so popular with the ladies!

Jane

And Red-tail females have the right idea, Jane. Forget the casseroles, and just get out there and dance!

Donegal Browne

Pale Male, Lola, and the New Girl, Valkyrie Plays Tennis, and No She Isn't the New Girl

Photo by Francois Portmann
Pale Male's New Girl
A reader had suggested that Valkyrie (also called Dominatrix), might be Pale Male's New Girl (Photo above) as they were both rather dark.

I asked photographer Francois Portman if he might have some photos for us to compare and yet again Francois came through with the goods.

Valkyrie is the next photo down. Compare the belly bands, the amount of white on head and under beak area, "eyebrows", and the dark patagial mark of the two hawks.

What? You came in late and missed the part about the patagial mark?

Time out. We'll recap.

Patagial is the adjective derived from the noun patagium.

Yes, and?

The patagium is the expanse of skin on the fore edge of the wing running from the head to the wrist. In this case, there is a dark patagial mark on the patagium. (Red-tailed hawks have a light under wing with a dark patagial mark which no other hawk species has in North America, making it a dandy field mark when the bird is in flight.)

Photo by Francois Portmann- www.fotoportmann.com/birdblog/
Directly above is a three view merged photo of Valkyrie of Tompkins Square Park.

Okay as long as we're talking about the patagial mark. How do they compare? Hmm.

I think New Girl's might be a bit darker particularly as the photo with Val's is taken from below against a bright sky likely making it appear darker than it might be if she were in the same position that New Girl is.

What about the white patch on the neck under the beak which supposedly all Red-tailed Hawks have. Check out New Girl first.

Looking at New Girl, one questions if the above is true. Do all Red-tailed hawks have that patch?

Whereas Val, check her neck out, comparatively has quite a visible bright white patch.

And the "eyebrow"? New Girl's, when you can see them, does appear more tawny.

And one of the biggest identifying factors to nail a particular hawk's identity--the belly band. And as Francois pointed out, just look how different they are. The difference is not only the saturation of color but also the shape appears completely different on the two birds.

THE CONCLUSION- We've definitely got two different birds here.

Pale Male just charms these floating females out of the sky whenever there is a need.

FROM LONG TIME CONTRIBUTOR ROBIN OF ILLINOIS REFERRING TO THE PIECE THAT'S LINKED BELOW--
"I believe their guestimate of the new mate's age is off by quite a bit, with her light eyes."

Without a doubt Robin, by 4 years old, New Girl's eyes would be getting onto as dark as they are going to get.

Here's the link to the piece, (which includes a quote from John Blakeman about Lola's likely cause of death).

http://gothamist.com/2011/01/18/central_park_hawk_goes_missing_her.php

Whimsy of Valkyrie of Tompkins Square Park Playing "Tennis"
by Francois Portmann
www.fotoportmann.com/birdblog/
Charming and hilarious besides.

And from Sally of Kentucky, another long time contributor, sent in this link of a supposed drunken owl in Germany standing in a stupor by a roadside. She believes the owl was far more likely to have had a head injury after being hit by a car as opposed to drinking schnapps. I have to agree.

German Police Pick up Drunken Owl

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,740157,00.html#ref=nlin

I'd not noticed before, and perhaps as we'd just had a blizzard it may be a somewhat new or irregular behavior, but at 8:30am, with the day still coming on, Doorstep Dove, Friend and another Dove, conceivably one of their youngsters from last summer, were out on the heated bird bath, warming up for the coming day.

Donegal Browne

John Blakeman on the New Mate of Pale Male, First Day Lambs, Cat, Rabbit, Dove Tracks in Snow, Chris Crow, and a Kestrel

Photo by Francois Portmann
www.fotoportmann.com/birdblog/
Pale Male's new mate in the Ramble.

Red-tailed Hawk expert John Blakeman talks about Pale Male's new mate and his prognosis for the 927 nest in the 2011 breeding season--

Donna,

Francois Portmann's photograph of the new Pale Male consort on your website reveals that the new bird is a young adult. It has still rather yellow irises, which indicates that she's just in her second year. She was hatched in the spring of 2009 and is in her first adult year. Consequently, she has no nesting experience.

But all of this is exactly what I would have predicted. The new bird was a "floater," an unmated young adult looking for a mate and a territory. In this case, the new hawk has struck herself rich. She's been able to align herself with a premier tiercel, Pale Male himself, along with his now historic territory.

The new formel's (female) inexperience could raise questions. Will she be able to attend to all of what's required to hatch and fledge eyasses, even though she's never engaged in any of this? The answer leans toward "yes."

Many first-year formels, especially with experienced tiercels in established territories, are able to get all of their mothering duties together and bring off eyasses. There is a good possibility for eyasses this spring. But, in honesty, it's not assured, for two reasons. First is that inexperienced red-tail haggards, particularly when both are attempting parenthood for the first time, very commonly fail. They assemble a nest, but don't get it very well built or very well insulated. Then, if eggs hatch, they sometimes aren't able to find, kill, and bring back enough prey for the newly-hatched eyasses. For inexperienced young red-tail hawks, it often takes a season of failure, where the pair works out what really needs to happen for future successes. This is a normal part of red-tail biology, so if the 927 nest fails this year, I'll attribute it to the inexperience of the new formel.

But she's got Pale Male showing her how things should be done. He's been there and done it all so many times before.

All of that, of course, raises the question of the failures at the 927 nest since it was destroyed and then reconstructed on the new nest support structure. If Pale Male is so experienced, with so many earlier successes, what, then, were the exact causes of the continuing nest failures in recent years, with not a single hatched eyass? Frankly, neither I nor anyone else knows.

Early on, I contended that the new nest support structure allowed too much cold air under the nest and this artificially cooled the eggs. But I don't think that's been the case in the last year or two, where much more nest material has been added each spring; leaving only three probable failure causes: geriatric infertility on the part of Pale Male (which I continue to dismiss), infertility of the earlier formel, Lola, or lastly, some sort of poisoning (which I also discount, inasmuch as poisoning would present very revealing behavioral manifestations).

So, let's hope that it's the fault of the now departed Lola, bless her avian heart. Let's focus on the new mate. I think she has a fine chance of bringing eyasses back to the 927 nest, even though this will be her first, excited breeding attempt.

--John Blakeman

Thanks John, I can't wait to see what happens!

Next up--
Early today I received a text message saying that one of young Jenny Langer's sheep, she and they were featured in a previous post, had just had twin lambs. In fact Jenny, coached by her dad Bob, had had to assist the ewe in the delivery. I'd never seen one day old lambs before, so I shoveled my way out of the driveway, hopped into the car, and headed for the Langer Farm.

I found Jenny in the Langer kitchen, surrounded by dozens of containers of dozens of different kinds of cookies. Jenny's mom Mary is an amazing and prolific cook. As it turned out Mary wasn't around as she'd been sent off to Farm and Fleet, a store that caters to farmers and truckers, to get sheep milk and colostrum replacement formula. ( I have a feeling I'd be hard pressed to find either in Manhattan.) And Jenny's dad Bob was out spreading manure on their corn fields so we were in charge of checking on the lambs every hour.

Jenny and I pulled on our boots and extra layers and headed for the sheep shed.

And this is what we found. I thought little ewe lamb, named Perky, for her amazing stability on her new legs and ability to trot right over to the teat, looked a bit like she'd been hit by a car. I stuck my hand in and rubbed her ears, they were a bit cold as she'd decided to sleep in the far corner away from the the heat lamp, but she roused and Jenny carried her over to the warm spot.


This is larger ram lamb, named Martin for having been born on Martin Luther King's Birthday. It appears that wildlife rehabilitator Cathy Horvath's theory that young male hawks get into and have more trouble than young female hawks holds true for sheep as well. Young Martin here took a long time to stand up and he's still not all that hot at eating.

In case you're wondering why this ewe always has hay all over her face, I was so I asked, her preferred method of eating is to bury her head in the hay barrel.


Ram Lamb on the left, with a good section of umbilical cord still hanging from his belly, appears to be smiling while Ewe Lamb is back to eating.

Speaking of eating, the ewe has an udder problem. Sheep have an udder with two teats. For some reason I had the idea that the udder as a whole manufactured milk which was dispensed by both teats. This turns out not to be the case. The udder is compartmentalized. One half creates milk for one teat, and the other half creates milk for the second teat. There's no cross over. The problem in this case is that one section of the udder is doing it's job and the other section isn't working. Which means only half the amount of milk is being created, only one teat works, and there are twin lambs. According to the vet, at maximum production the one teat that is working will only create 75% of the milk that each lamb needs. Hence Mary's trip to Farm and Fleet.

More on this later but now, a short tangent as I want to know about sheep tails.

Okay, have you ever heard the expression, "three shakes of lamb's tail" as a way to say something happened rapidly? Previous to this I've never seen what a shake of a lamb's tail looked like. It's actually quite odd. A lamb's tail, or a sheep's tail for that matter, is really quite limp. So it shakes from the base and the rest wiggles and curls round quickly but limply.

And the reason I'd not seen one though I had seen any number of sheep is because the tails are ordinarily docked. Why? I asked. And was told that as the tails just hang there limply and can't be lifted by the animal except from the base when defecating...well, you get the picture.

My question then becomes what do sheep tails look like in wild sheep. Why would an animal evolve who's tail will almost certainly be covered in excrement all the time?

Humans have "evolved" domestic sheep by selective breeding for what we're going to use them for . And my suspicion is that the tails of wild sheep and domesticated sheep are different in some way. Either a difference in structure or in the amount of wool on them could make a difference to the issue.



It turns out that although the ewe was in labor, for some reason, she wasn't pushing and she was bleating a good deal. It was decided that she was having trouble delivering . Therefore Bob told Jenny to pull her right arm out of her sweatshirt and coat. She did. She then put on a glove that went all the way up to her shoulder and inserted her arm into the ewe. While being directed by her dad as to what to feel for. Eventually she found a pair of rear hoofs and was told to pull. She did. She'd gotten the legs pulled out and then let go. Everyone then expected that the ewe would then push the lamb the rest of the way out. Nope. During the next contraction he popped back inside and she had to do it again.

Mom attempts to rouse Martin in hopes of getting him up and eating as he's a slow learner. Smaller Perky, alternatively, is making sure she gets her share and more.

The other ewes have come inside to see how things are going. They seem quite fond of watching the new babies.


The ram Sherman has been moved from his original pen in the shed to the Siberia of sheep pens much closer to the open door. Don't worry he's a big guy and he can take it. In fact he's only penned as rams, similar to bulls, aren't all that trustworthy and have actually been known to kill people in a snit. His previous pen had to be given to the ewe who was thought not ready to give birth yet , but being of another opinion on the matter, she delivered her lamb into a snow bank, two days earlier.

Speaking of Sherman, for whatever reason and I'm told he doesn't do it with anyone else, but when I speak to him, he cocks his head and appears to be listening intently.

Have you noticed how tiny Sherman's ears are? Look at the ewe above again. Those are a far more normal size for sheep ears. In fact the lamb's ears are bigger than Sherman's are.


Mom tries to get Martin to get up and eat again. But it's time for Mom to get the shots that may help get the other side of her udder going.
Bob and Jenny hold the ewe in the corner of the stall and Bob digs though the wool down to skin for the inter-muscular injection. Perky true to her name is not to be left out and has scampered over to watch the proceedings.

Being next to mom is important no matter what.

Ram Lamb is a bit confused as to where the udder is located.

Mom takes a rest next to Ram Lamb. She's had rather a hard day herself, delivering twins with hoofs after all.

Mom nudges Martin into place. She does seem to be paying attention to who's eating and who's not.

Mom keeps a sharp eye on Jenny as she attempts to cut the floppy edges off Ram Lambs coat so they don't catch on anything.

All in all, everyone is doing pretty well.

The Annoyed kitten.
In actuality he probably isn't annoyed all the time, he just looks it. He has extra thick hair on his forehead and somehow that makes him appear annoyed or that is Jenny's supposition anyway.

I figure it's time for me to head out before it gets so dark that I loose my way trying to get home. Besides I want to get back to the house and check out some of the tracks in the snow.

Domestic house cat tracks. A walking Cat often steps onto the spot it has previously stepped, overlaying the previous print. Making the tracks appear as a single file line of prints.

Note the overlap of two different feet . Also note there are no claw prints for obvious reasons. Kitty feet have retractable claws.

Rabbit tracks. if it looks like slightly off kilter exclamation points, you've got bunny tracks.

Bisecting rabbit and cat tracks.

And last but not least, Mourning Dove tracks in the snow.

Christopher Crow takes off from the bird bath and heads for the goodie stump.

Just beyond the new pole is a small bird and that bird is a Kestrel. I see them so infrequently that I pulled over into a snow bank, while the other traffic zipped by and tried to get his photograph. This guy was wary and before I got anywhere near him he was off the wire and heading into the woods. Considering the crash in the Kestrel population outside cities, wariness is perhaps the reason that he's still around.

Donna Browne