Octavia Feeds! Pale Male and Octavia Have Done It Again!!!

Photo courtesy of  palemale.com

From hawkwatcher Beth Eberly-

Donegal,

I saw Octavia leaning down in the nest and then doing what looks like feeding!

B.E.

Beth, if it looks like feeding it is feeding as nothing else hawks do looks like it!

SOUND THE HORNS AND START THE MUSIC, 
PALE MALE AND OCTAVIA HAVE A HATCH!!!!

Why Don't Eyasses Talons Poke Holes in Their Nest Mates? Plus Mystery Eggs, the Fascinating Tool Using, Machine Destructing Kea, Cornell Lab Red-tail Hatch and More on Eradibait

   http://www.livestream.com/nytnestcam
 I've always wondered how eyasses on the nest manage not to eviscerate each other with their taloned toed, out of control feet. 

Yesterday Boo and Scout (Yes, the NY Times baby names for the hawks poll has chosen two of the protagonists from To Kill A Mocking Bird.) were napping and very restless.  Obviously their pin feathers were irking them and Rosie was tending to them by preening. They'd finally settled down when suddenly a foot shot out of the eyass pile like a punching fist.  Not that even Rosie wasn't rather surprised herself by the explosive foot appearance and she stared at it for some time.

And that is when I noticed that the "shooting foot", (Ah ha!) had its toes and therefore its talons folded in.  Part of the explanation I'm assuming for why the eyasses don't poke holes in each other while tossing and turning in their sleep on a regular basis.


And for those of you who have written in  asking  about the "hatch window" for Pale Male and Zena of 927 Fifth Avenue-- We have a couple days yet before there will be any possibility of  seeing any signs of a hatch.  

Remember the count on this nest is quite fluid.


We start the count  from the first overnight of the formel on the nest as we've no cam or overlooking window to see the bowl of the nest and whether she is actually sitting on anything.


Also the bowl of the Fifth Avenue nest is very deep.  We won't be able to see the eyasses at all until they are at least upright if not completely ambulatory.  We have to wait to see feeding motions.  Ordinarily these are initially the formel standing on the nest edge making poking movements into the bowl.


By the time that clue is seen sometimes the "hatch window" has been passed but we still haven't been able to confirm a hatch.


Part of the "charm" of Pale Male's nest site is the finesse it takes to confirm eyasses on that nest.

 Photo: Donegal Browne
 Another mystery discovered yesterday, was this nest in the clematis with its seemingly none matching eggs.  The last two years the nest in the clematis has belonged to Chipping Sparrows who were predated by Cowbirds.  But when I accidentally flushed the sitter of this nest yesterday, she took off like a flash, without any real identifying characteristics beyond it was smallish, and for whatever instinctual reason, I doubted it was a Chipping Sparrow nest.


I looked in the nest.  Wow, that's weird.  The Cowbirds didn't match up their eggs with the sitters very well this year did they?   Which made me wonder if the White-throated Sparrows had the nest and the Cowbirds who predate that nest yearly only lay Chipping Sparrow-ish looking eggs.


So what do White-throat eggs like like anyway?

      Photo courtesy of Todd Ratermann 
http://www.southeasternoutdoors.com/wildlife/birds/white-throated-sparrow.html
Well it turns out they're greenish with lots of brown speckles.  
Some obviously with more brown speckles than others.  But some of the ones in my nest have hardly any speckles at all.  Time for another look around the web.

 Another nest of mixed looking eggs but still more speckled than the ones in the nest of the clematis.

 http://amityheritageroses.wordpress.com/

DRAT!!!   Perhaps tomorrow I'll be able to try for another look at whoever is sitting on the clematis nest.

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Wallpaper/Nature/Birds/Parrots/index.html

                                          Kea Eating Rental Car

Contributor Robin of Illinois, with always an eye for avian tool using topics sent in a video link for a comparison of a Caledonian Crow and a Kea Parrot in such matters..
  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzEdi074SuQ&feature=related

Notice that the Kea in the stick test was unable to use her beak to poke the stick horizontally into the hole because of the shape of her beak/mouth. Therefore she got it in the hole with the assistance of her foot and then was able to adjust it to a horizontal position so it would release the food.

 And the text with background of the study:

http://goodnews.ws/blog/2011/06/15/parrots-and-crows-show-their-inventive-side/

Which got me interested in New Zealand's Kea Parrots altogether.  Here are the links for a three part Attenborough piece on the extremely smart, ingenious, havoc wreaking, butter loving,  team working, sometimes predatory, (the only known parrot species to be so) endangered Kea Parrot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Twg4Yg4gFoo&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpJYrfMEKqM&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekGkyC1hDlY&feature=related

 A heads-up from Sally of Kentucky-  The Cornell Lab Red-tails have a hatch!
http://www.livestream.com/cornellhawks

Sally also forwarded the information on Eradibait, the supposedly non-toxic to everything but rodents rodenticide, to her supervisor at the wildlife rehab facility that she works with and below is the response from the folks who make Eradibait.  (It had occurred to me that perhaps it wasn't available as yet in the U.S.)

Thank you for your enquiry. Ilex Enviro-Sciences distribute Eradibait in the

UK & Eire only, however we are aware that although product approval  is not

currently held in the USA the owners of this unique rodenticide, Zea

Sciences Limited,  are working on registration issues with the EPA

[regulatory authority] and hope to offer the product very soon.

Best Regards

Barbara

Therefore, if we believe in the 7 degrees of 

separation theory, does anybody know anybody who 

might know someone who knows someone who

could talk the EPA into putting Eradibait 

onto the fast track for testing?  

No I don't mean skipping

relevant necessary testing but rather perhaps 

putting Eradibait a little closer to the head 

of the line for testing in the first place. 

By the way, check out the comments on the previous post.  Long time blog contributor Betty Jo of California, has a heads up concerning another nursery sold invasive plant that like Garlic Mustard is wreaking ecosystem havoc.

Sam Says It's a Hatch as Do the Rest of This Evenings Hawk Bench Warmers!!!

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
It was around 6PM and very wet when daughter Samantha arrived at the Bench. Already holding the Bench down in the rain, with the company of a couple of chubby NYC pigeons, and some begging squirrels were, from the left in deep discussion about the nest activity-- Stella, Katherine, Kenturian, and Margaret. Sam of course was there but behind the camera.

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
About 6:25 Ginger, got up out of the nest and began tearing a piece of prey into small bits. She then put her head into the nest bowl.

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
A slightly larger thumbnail.

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
Then her beak would go to the prey and then back into the bowl with slight poking movements.

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
There was consensus at The Bench. It's a HATCH!!!!

After 6 years of horrid disappointment, IT HAS FINALLY HAPPENED!!!

What a stunner.

Photograph courtesy of palemale.com
In the meantime, once-again-dad Pale Male is over on the railing of the Oreo building being attacked by a Kestrel. He guards the territory, hunts all day, and what does he get? No respect, that's for sure. But it is all part of the job. He allows himself to be a target and keeps Kestrel interested in him as opposed to Mom and the kid(s).

Photograph by Samantha Browne-Walters
Every season for the last six years I've watched this nest for at least part of each season. In 2005 I watched it exclusively until finally Lola, after an extra month of sitting, ragged feathered and a brood patch gone purple from pressing against the underlying cradle spikes, she gave up the nest. Pale Male then tried to tempt her back with tasty tidbits and sat himself for long hours hoping she would return. Finally he too, gave up.

It was an emotional crusher.

After the destruction of the nest in 2004, the protesting in bitter cold, leading the revolt with Honk for Hawks on Fifth Avenue, world wide pressure on the condo board, panels of experts deciding how to build something for the nest to sit atop, and its installation. And Pale Male and Lola had taken to rebuilding their nest like a dream. The Model Boat Pond crammed with people waiting for a hatch that never came.

Would it have been better not to have insisted that they be allowed to nest on their old site? Something had gone wrong. Who were we humans to think we could do it better than the hawks did? If not able to use 927 would Pale Male and Lola have found a new nest site and there would have been a hatch like usual?

First the meddling of tearing down the nest was a travesty, but had we made it worse by settling for the carriage? As it was a different set up should we have said, don't bother and Pale Male and Lola would have found a new site and all would have been well?

Speaking of hawk watching despair, we had bitter years of it. It was physically painful but as time went by I knew I was still very sad about it but somehow we accepted that quite probably there would never be eyasses in Pale Male's nest again. We lived with it.

Then yesterday, when I was alerted that there might be a hatch on Pale Male's nest. I sat down and wept. Tears made of years pain, and now possible relief and happiness! Eureka! We might have done okay by Pale Male, the human trusting hawk, after all!

So what did go wrong? I've been thinking about this constantly since hope reared her lovely head on the 20th. I began comparing the breeding history of Pale Male and Lola with that of Charlotte and Pale Male Jr. from 2005 on in my head.

It was late in the 2005 season when Pale Male and Lola gave up their nest. By then we knew that the Trump Parc nest of Charlotte and Junior had once again failed as well. Their eggs had blown off the nest, yet again.

Then there was a rumor that there was activity around the Trump Parc nest which most watchers discounted. It was too late for anything to happen and besides the nest site wasn't the least bit watcher friendly. Unless a hawk was standing near the edge of corbel on the Trump Parc there was nothing to see at all. Zip.

Whatever the case, I was miserable about Pale Male and Lola and even if there was the slightest chance something was happening on the Trump, I was going to go look.

I trundled back and forth in hot summer weather with a rolly bag full of equipment on the very south end of Central Park right up next to the wall looking for a spot that might give even a speck of better viewing of the nest. Eventually I set up and made myself keep my eyes glued to the corbel. Nothing could be seen of twigs or nesting materials. I waited. I waited for hours. Nothing. Then, it didn't take more than 5 seconds and if I'd glanced away I'd have missed it. A hawk came out from behind a building, landed on the corbel and another took off the corbel and disappeared behind an another building on the other side.

It was a pair doing a switch of a nest in a near blink of an eye. There had to be eggs up there! And there were. They'd double clutched. Two healthy eyasses, Big and Little, fledged off the Trump that summer of 2005.

In 2006 both nests failed, but a dog walker had seen a nest on the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. The walker told hawk watchers. It was the nest of Isolde and Tristan.

In I think 2007, Junior and Charlotte moved to 888, a space that could not be seen from the ground. But Brett Odom could see it from his office and sometimes Lincoln Karim found a seat with a view in an adjacent building. We watched by proxy. That year they only had one egg hatch. And it was Ziggy, the fledgling that came down into Ziegfield Plaza and created a sensation during rush hour and then became entangled with many city departments with their many experts. But Isolde and Tristan came through with Big Sister and Little Brother. 927 failed again.

Then Charlotte and Junior failed year after year or didn't nest at all. One year, and egg was laid, but Charlotte was acting very odd (neurological issues?) and did not brood it. This year 2011, they've not been seen really and the hope is they nest in a spot we've not discovered. But upon thought, it appears to me that they had started having serious fertility problems.

In the meantime, the spikes that had so enpurpled Lola's brood patch and had been chilling the eggs were removed. How could they not have been, they were so close they were bruising her and were connected to exposed metal in the outside air. And still Lola and Pale Male failed. Was Pale too old? Had he become infertile? But we'd heard of hawks years older than Pale Male who were fertile to the end of their lives.

Now we know, Pale Male is not infertile. It was likely Lola who was infertile

Here is my hypotheses. As Pale Male and Lola had had a healthy clutch in 2004, but the eggs didn't hatch in 2005, it was the cradle not sudden infertility that caused the failure.

We now know that increasing low levels of rat poison in a hawk can cause infertility, accidents do occur due to neurological difficulties, and eventually death.

The more frequented portions of Central Park and hence areas with restaurants and food venders have more rat poison laid in them. Pale Male is perfectly capable of hunting rats which he does for mates who like them but personally he prefers avian meals. Lola seemed always to prefer mammals.

If we use the fertility decline of Charlotte and Junior as a rough gauge and compare it to Lola, by the time the cradle had been corrected, Lola was well into an infertility decline due to rat poison.

Ginger who is young and likely new to the park and it's insidious rat bait does not suffer from the problem as yet so she and Pale Male have been able to reproduce.

These are all hypotheses. But if eventually Pale Male and Ginger begin to have fertility issues, it may be because Ginger's system has reached the poison tipping point. Anecdotal to be sure, but if at all possible all hawks no matter how we think they died, even being hit by a car can be the result of neurological issues due to poison, should be tested for poison upon their deaths.

And as it is late in the season for dumb squirrels, and according to hawk watchers of long standing first food for eyasses on 927 brought by Pale Male is mammal. In this case, it was rat.

We must get the rat bait out of Pale Male and Ginger's territory before these long awaited eyasses are poisoned like those of the Riverside pair.

On that thought here is Pale Male news from ABC as of May 20th,
http://abcnews.go.com/US/pale-male-red-tailed-hawk-yorks-avenue-father/story?id=13643583

Donegal Browne
P.S. It's late on a very exciting day. More from contributors and the publishing of comments later yes, but coming soon. Time to tap dance!

FLASH!!!! HATCH ON FIFTH AVENUE? And Battle of the Bath Part 3

April 2011, Photo courtesy of www.palemale.com/

Have they done it ?

On Thursday, Marie Winn of mariewinnnaturenews, and the author of Red-tails in Love, heard from Rik Davis, who spends his days at the Hawk Bench, that there might be a hatch on Pale Male's nest.

WHAT? Can it be true? Wouldn't it be wonderful!

Marie took to her heels and headed for the park.
For the latest report click her link above.

Though things are yet to be confirmed Marie saw what she took to be feeding behavior. And Marie, after watching this nest for many years, would be hard to fool. She has seen feeding behavior for many years.

The only thing I can think of that might fool us all, and no one has ever seen it happen that I know of, is if Ginger Lima had the hormonal urge to feed and being a new mom, she was feeding nothing. Though Red-tail literature says that a new mom is cued to feed initially by the sound of an eyass begging for food, so if correct that throws the feeding nothing possibility out the window.

Marie said she would try to give me a call from the Bench with news tomorrow.

This evening, I called my daughter Sam, who is conveniently back in NYC from college, and asked her (okay, I admit it, told her) to hotfoot herself down to the Bench Friday. Sam, though just a kid in 2004, was a diehard protester for the return of Pale Male's nest.

The news will have spread by Friday and the Clan of Pale Male will have gathered.

I can't wait for tomorrow!

In the meantime, as getting to tomorrow is a nail biter, it is time for TA DA, the third installment of 2011's Battle of the Bath.

You may remember that Red-breasted Grosbeak got tired of waiting on the stick pile for a chance at a bath. Starling, Grackle, and Red-winged Blackbird were taking forever so he did a surprise stealth attack from below the bowl. Shocking Starling so much he completely embarrassed himself. Eventually Grosbeak stared everyone out of the bath but Starling, he had his reputation to think of after all, and that's where this segment picks up.

Grosbeak leans in.

He pops in with a "smile" and Starling stops wallowing and stares.

FINE! He goes back to wallowing.

Grosbeak starts bathing.

Starling turns and looks offensive, and Grosbeak's posture reeks, just try it buddy. I'll leap on your face.

Suddenly Grosbeak stops short and Starling turns toward the park. If you look closely it rather looks like Starling is wearing a gorilla mask on the back of his head.

Grosbeak continues his focus towards the house.

Then Grosbeak turns away and goes further toward the far edge of the bowl.

WAAAAAAA! Guess who? It's Grosbeak's mate with her own surprise stealth attack and goodness-- where did Starling go?

This ends Part 3. To be continued...

Donegal Browne
P.S. By the way, the food that was delivered by Pale Male to the nest earlier in the day, and from which his mate was feeding, was a rat. The rat poison boxes have not been removed from Pale Male's territory this year.