Forham Hatch! News from the Franklin Institute, a possible John Blakeman Seminar and Now-Teeny Bunny and Bread-eating Robin

Remember the Robin caught eating cracked corn?   Well Corn Robin has now taken to eating bread.  Strange, very strange.


It appears that Tiny Bunny has a sibling--Teeny Timid Bunny.

Can you see him?  He's near the inside rim of the Big Nest.

                                                 There he is.

Teeny Bunny flattens his ears, hides his eye, and I go away.

There's a hatch at Fordham!!!!  Here is news from the two main watchers of Rose and Vince!

Christopher Lyons wrote: I've been seeing both adults together away from the nest for a number of days now, so I figured there had been a hatch, but didn't spot any young until this afternoon, heading back from lunch.   Saw Rose feeding the smaller of the two chunks of pigeon, while the larger looked on.  Possible there's more--Rose hasn't had fewer than three in quite a long time now, and she managed four last season, but maybe food is less abundant this year.  I'd say the elder was maybe two weeks out of the egg. 

Fordham Commencement is this weekend, so the babies will have quite a show going on around them.  Then a nice long calm quiet period in which to mature. 

Then  the news from Rich Fleisher-- There is at least three eyasses. I posted a picture on my flickr page.
  

Sent from my Android phone with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.

 Every wonder where the rats were coming from that helped Franklin Institute Mom feed the eyasses upon the the demise of their father, and even now supplement  what Franklin Mom and the New Dad (T2) bring to the nest?

Some interesting goodies, complete with a John Blakeman teaser,  collected  from the Franklin Institute Chat Room by Jackie Dover of Tulsa and passed on by Robin of Illinois.

Some informative background information from the Franklin chat which Jackie collected this morning:

Apparently Franklin is still making at least 2 rat drops a day, morning, & ate afternoon. "carditoo" and less frequently, Della (who writes the Franklin blog), are the rat droppers.

T2 (step-dad) brought a huge brown rat this morning.

7:51 carditoo: I do most of the drops, but Della (sunnyDixie) spells me when I have to be away for the day

7:51 carditoo: she does some of the late afternoon drops

7:52 carditoo: Della and Kay Meng (photog) have been up to the boardroom on many occasions to prepare special blog entries

7:53 carditoo: it is because of Della's link to the FI decision makers that they knew they could count on us to help w/the food drops.

7:55 carditoo: it helped that I had started volunteering at SWRC (Rick's rehab) and knew where to get rats and was comfortable handling them

7:58 carditoo: I order the rats on line from a company that supplies all sorts of things to folks who need to feed wild animals/pets/etc. Rodentpro.com

7:59 carditoo: the rats are delivered by fed ex packed in dry ice

8:00 PeggyPenn: Do you have to thaw them first?????

8:00 carditoo: yes thaw them first

8:01 carditoo: my freezer is interesting; rats on one side, ice cream on the other

8:02 buckaru: ROFL!

8:02 bobkat13: ratcicles in the middle

8:03 lnphilly: give a whole new meaning to rocky road ice cream

8:04 carditoo: look at the size of that brown rat T2 dropped [in addition to the white rat already there this morning]

8:05 carditoo: we'll do a blog entry; ratdrop 101

8:05 lnphilly: after seeing Mom at the window yesterday when you were doing rat drop, my appreciation of all you do increased

8:05 bobkat13: I really think that's a good idea, Cardi. Your tales of "Rat Droppings" would interest many

8:07 buckaru: Birthday gift ideas for Cardi: body armor, face mask, helmet, falconry glove?

8:08 lnphilly: we're trying to figure out what she's going to do when they fledge

8:08 aimbomb: get on the roof cardi

8:08 buckaru: Hot air balloon?

8:08 carditoo: I think drops if necessary will happen in middle of night when they are all in nest asleep

8:09 buckaru: Inphilly: Excellent way to stay in Mom's good graces.

8:10 reikiferret: Is this his first large catch?

8:10 bobkat13: He brouht wabbit the other day

8:10 carditoo: and maybe a pigeon and a squirrel

8:18 carditoo: JBlakeman thinks 98% chance they'll be back next year

8:19 bellabell01: excellent news

8:19 lnphilly: JB was great

8:19 bobkat13: Yes, he's always very patient with us, and has been keeping us informed for years

8:19 lnphilly: He was talking about coming here to give a seminar

8:19 carditoo: JB says T2 bringing food and sticks, feeding kids, means it's his nest now



Donegal Browne

Wednesday Miscellany-Pale Male, Mama Of Queens, the Washington Square Eyasses, Robin Chicks, and Tiny Bunny

Pale Male arrives with a delivery and stares at his nest full of eyasses while Zena looks on.
Screen capture courtesy of palemale.com

Mama of Queens stands her nightly vigil with her eyasses, courtesy of New York City Audubon and http://www.jknaturegallery.com/rth_nestcam.html

Rosie takes a break, leaving the eyasses on their own. Note the parental tail feather, left.  Unusual for one to drop at this time of year.  And once again a clear view through the newly cleaned window.  http://www.livestream.com/nytnestcam

Remember the Robin nest in the four foot bush?  In a year of incessant nest robbing, this Robin pair hatched three and have kept three chicks.

I was moving some wood in the wood pile when suddenly the tiniest of baby bunnies hippity made an appearance and hopped as fast as her tiny haunches would take her into the long grass at the end of the garden.

 And there she stayed, frozen, at least while I was looking.  A half hour later or so, I was at the other end of the garden.  I looked up and there was a mature rabbit about 15 feet away, staring at me.  She then slowly went into the grass where tiny bunny had hidden.  I then went back to watering the straw, which I hope will turn into a Wine Cap Mushroom patch.


Neither reappeared while I was out and I wonder if Mom Bunny nursed tiny bunny in the tall grass.


Donegal Browne

STEP-DAD RED-TAILED HAWK!!!--A NEW ONE FOR THE "LITERATURE"Franklin Mom Takes a New Mate Who Is Feeding Her Eyasses!

Photo from FaceBook by way of Tulsa's Jackie Dover, by way of Robin of Illinois

Smaller new Franklin Stepdad on the left and larger Franklin Mom on the right.  As original Pale Male Regular Ben Cacace used to say, "NEVER UNDERESTIMATE A RED-TAIL!"  And this is definitely an occasion for the sentiment.

Hold onto your hats!!! 

  As we know, rapid bonding with a new mate, once the living hawk knows their previous mate has died, or when the reproductive imperative (It's time to COPULATE!) takes over,  can sometimes be a nearly same day process.  But Franklin Institute Mom, has done something I've not only never seen,  can't find a mention of it in the hawk literature either, but it appears no one in on the latest has ever seen or heard of the behavior either.

 She's gone and bonded with a new male while she has eyasses on the nest.  Ordinarily a formel  with eyasses on the nest, attempts to take care of them on her own while also protecting the territory from interlopers.  And another Red-tail is considered an interloper.

 This tiercel must is a real charmer.

I'm completely boggled!

 Why would a male take over the care and feeding of another tiercel's brood?

Now perhaps this isn't as rare as we think? 

 I don't know, we've had a number of instances of widowed hawks with nests full of young who didn't bond with a new hawk though they certainly could have used the help.

And why would a tiercel take on the care of another male's progeny.  In many species, males are out to do in the young of a new mate so he can replace them with offspring of his own.

Why would a tiercel do this? 

Here's my hypothesis--perhaps this tiercel had a mate and young of about this age this season.  Could they all have died? Frounce could have done it for instance, and left the  tiercel in the hormonal stage of the reproductive continuum in which he's being spurred to hunt like a maniac and feed young.

Then he comes across Franklin Mom and her nest full of eyasses.  There's no male fending him off so perhaps with the above posited biological urges, he hunts and makes a gift to mom.

Which during this time a year is also food to be fed to eyasses.

The urges meld and suddenly Mom has herself a new mate taking on all the responsibilities of mates at this time of year.

 Wow!

 Check out the main blog covering the Franklin Institute Nest for their take.

Franklin Institute Camera

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Hawk history at the Franklin Institute: a stepdad already?

Just as we were recovering a little from the sadness at losing Dad, our beloved tiercel, and admiring the formel's ability to single-parent, aided so effectively by the Franklin Institute's food drops, events started tumbling from Sunday morning onwards faster than we could follow.

Red-tail hawk history is being made as it appears that a new tiercel has moved into the Franklin Institute territory, has been accepted by mom, and they are now pair-bonded.  It is unprecedented for a formel with eyasses on the nest to tolerate another hawk in her territory, let alone come anywhere close to the nest. yet this image taken yesterday from the exterior nest camera, clearly shows the new tiercel in front flying with a vole into the nest, closely accompanied by the formel.

MORE
http://sunnydixie.blogspot.com/ 

Donegal Browne