133rd St. Kestrels

Three eyass in the scrape...all fledged yesterday, just after my minor traffic accident, doh!




Best of luck little guys!

Rooftop Kestrel

The top of the Dwyer has turned out to be a bounty in terms of expanding my Urban Raptor knowledge. Able to observe the birds for long periods of time, I have been able to mark the ranges, hunting habits and numbers of mated raptor pairs. My one regret is that while seeing the big picture well, the close-up one has been largely absent save for the view from my spotting scope. Instead, I have been treated to the occasional close passes by the hawks, falcons, crows and song birds as they cruised past towards the southern Parks. Today at noon however this pattern was interrupted. I heard the distinct killy, killy, killy of a pair of kestrels somewhere nearby. By the time I got them in site, the male had flown off south, while the female remained.

She flew down to a vent pipe (a common ambush perch). Kestrels also use the heat to stay warm--a necessary trait for quick reflexes).

Bracing against the vicious wind, I took my eye off her for a second...and she was gone. I picked my head up off the camera just in time to see her arc in just over my head and round the corner! As I wheeled around, there! She had landed on the corner of my building.

Mmm...not the best light on her, so I carefully made my way across to the bird! She allowed me to get quite close.

Framed against the St. Nicholas Houses.
One of the most fascinating things I observed was how this tiny bird manages in the brutal gale. A particularly strong draft hit her, and she adopted this pose!

Notice how she uses her left wing to deflect the wind upward, thereby creating downpressure on her feet. Notice how she's digging in with her talons! This is a bird that weighs about 1 oz., resisting a 40mph wind! She then turned to face the northern courtyard...

and used the same wind to propel her at a flight of sparrows!

Look at the gore on her talons!

Fall Migrants Begin

There were tons more of fall warblers moving through the area. For some reason, I found lots of females including yellow rumped, magnolias and black-throated greens. I also saw a red-tailed hawk and peregine falcon, but was too slow to get any pix of them as they streaked by. Walking through the foliage, I heard the many shrieks of yellow shafted flickers. At one point I watched as one flew into a tree and snagged a screeching cicada. As always, many resident pairs of American Kesrels thrive along the cities parks. There seems to be another pair in the 145th and Broadway area and I regularly see this male near Riverside Park. Bruce Yolton has also reported seeing a female kestrel there this spring. Anyone else see kestrels in that area, please let me know.

Mid-Summer's Fledgles

In a few weeks, the heat and summer sun will make this years crop of fledges scarce. Now is the peak of their activity. As I transverse Harlem, I took a informal survey of all the fleglings I could find. There was good news to report! On 125th and 155th I found two groups of 3 successful crow fledglings. I also found a group of 2 kingbirds fleglings, the 3 kestrel fleglings and signs of the 3 Highbridge babies. In addition, there was a massive erruption of cicada killers! We start with the young kestrels.






Nearby I found the young kingbirds.



Suddenly the young kingbirds swooped down on the cicada killers!

I was amazed as it deftly plucked the huge and menacing wasp out of the air! It landed next to its sibling!

And clubbed the unfortunate insect on a branch.

Also within in spitting distance were a crop of new crows! Its great to see two successfull nests back in Harlem after the devastation of West Nile. They were sunning themselves in the brilliant sunlight!
'




I also saw these two adult RTH's! This one stealthily landing on CCNY...


And one of the Highbridge parents perfectly concealed in the shade of a huge locust tree just off of the nest.