Spring bird migration is underway

We've had a dreary start to spring this year, but there are a few bright signs that sunnier days are ahead.  Spring bird migration is underway and a few colorful travelers are passing through the city.

A flock of Cedar Waxwings has been feasting on berries and buds in the 6&B Community garden.  They're beautiful and I love their black bandit masks.





Sharing...





Several Eastern Phoebes have been eating tiny insects in Tompkins and Battery Park.





Hunting from a low perch on the grass:



A flock of about twenty Dark-Eyed Juncos have been mingling with robins on the Tompkins Square lawns.  The difference in coloring among them is striking.

Male:



Female:



This Pine Warbler was the first warbler sighting this season in Tompkins Square.  I'm always excited to see a yellow bird.



Song Sparrows have been filling the air with music.  Listen to their calls here.





A Field Sparrow was found rooting around in the grass under the Tompkins Square holiday tree.  They also have an interesting song that sounds like a bouncing ball.



This cute little Chipping Sparrow walked right up to me as though it had something to say.

Hello!



Finally, Brown Creepers can be seen creeping up the trunks of trees in Tompkins.  They start at the bottom and work their way up.




See more of my recent bird photos here.

Christo and Dora keep busy while waiting for eggs to hatch

It's been a slow hawk-watching time while Christo and Dora brood their eggs in Tompkins Square.  They take turns doing nest duty every hour or so.  When Dora is on break, she usually flies around to stretch her wings, then perches somewhere near the nest to eat and preen.  When Christo is out and about, he does some hunting and gathering of nest material.  This season, he seems to be spending more time outside the park, perhaps securing their territory.

As we've had some crummy weather lately, the photos below are all from the 29th when we enjoyed a bit of sun.  I found Christo perched on the Christodora late in the day and he seemed to be watching the area of the park near the basketball courts.



After a few minutes, Christo dove off the building and came right down to the area where I was standing on the east side of the women's restroom.





He landed on a fence to take a closer look at the dinner selection running around in the bushes.



It took him just seconds to pull up a rat.







He took the rat to the area behind the park offices, which was locked, so I was unable to follow.  I thought he'd bring it back out to the nest and hand it off to Dora, but he must have eaten it all himself as he took a while and, when he did fly out of the area, he no longer had the rat.

Ever industrious, Christo flew straight to an elm tree on the central lawn where he stripped some bark off a branch.  Judging by the state of the branch, it looks like this is a favorite.



The branch is dead, so maybe the bark is loose and easy to pull off.



Christo then flew the bark up to the nest where he took over egg-brooding duty and gave Dora a dinner break.



Just as the sun set, Dora flew out of the nest and went over to a tree next to the Avenue A playground where she ate some stashed food.





I love how Dora's chest feathers look so glamorously swishy. 



Meanwhile, the previous nest in the ginkgo tree is almost gone.  Here's how it looked on Saturday:



Compared to last May:



I hope we'll have a view of fuzzy little bobbleheads in the new nest by mid-May.

This week's Christo and Dora adventures

In this week's Tompkins Square hawk adventures, we find Christo hunting rats by lamp light Friday evening.





Although Christo was most interested in rats, he couldn't resist going after a squirrel who taunted him from a nearby tree.  He lunged at it, missed, and consequently scared the rats away.  The squirrel then chased after Christo as he retreated to another tree.  As he flew past me, I heard him making his "annoyed" growl and also saw that he had a funky white feather hanging down the center of his tail.



Speaking of tails, I noticed on Saturday that Dora is missing two tail feathers.  The gap is clearly visible when she flies.



Dora doesn't molt until late July, and I doubt two feathers could have been dislodged by moving around in the nest.  I suspect someone/thing pulled them out.  Maybe a squirrel, blue jay or other hawk.  I really don't know.

In other strange happenings, Christo has been taking food to the old nest in the ginkgo.  The hawks  have shown zero interest in that nest until recently and made no attempt to rebuild it, so I was surprised to see Christo using it as a kitchen table.  There's barely anything left of it.



While Dora spends most of her time brooding eggs, Christo goes on food runs.  On Saturday, he picked up a fresh rat from the bird bath area.







Note the white tail feather had fallen out by this time.



After taking the rat to a tree to prepare it, he flew it back towards Dora at the nest.



Christo took over brood duty while Dora went out to eat dinner.  When the hawks are down in the nest, they're almost impossible to see from below.  Curiosity got the better of this squirrel, who scampered out onto the branch and crawled right up the side of the nest.



Christo quickly sprang up, but was unable to leap out quick enough.



Dora to the rescue!  She saw what was happening and zoomed in to chase off the squirrel.  It all happened so fast, I only barely captured the squirrel's tail along the branch on the far left.  Christo looks on from inside the nest.



The squirrel escaped and nobody got hurt, this time.

Brooding time and troublesome neighbors

The Tompkins Square hawks are brooding now, and I think we can safely assume all eggs have been laid.  The Washington Square hawks laid their third egg on March 17, and the Tompkins Square hawks are usually a couple of days behind them.  I saw Christo and Dora mating on Saturday, so I took that to mean all their eggs had not been laid by that point.  I'm guessing the third (if there is a third) could have been laid Sunday or Monday.  This is all speculation on my part because no one can see into the nest to see what is actually there.

Christo and Dora have been making regular nest-switches and Christo has been industrious as ever.  He is the primary food provider and here he is with a mouse for Dora.



When he's not hunting, there is always nest maintenance to be done.  Below, Christo peels bark from a maple tree.





Here he is flying a redwood branch back to the nest.  He has previously favored that tree for nesting material.



The hawks are also having to deal with troublesome neighbors (welcome to New York!).  Below, a squirrel confronts Christo as he plucks a pigeon.



Across the park, another squirrel watches as Dora eats lunch.



On Saturday, there was a worrisome incident when a third raptor (I couldn't see what it was) caused both Christo and Dora to take off and leave the nest unattended.  A squirrel took advantage and crept up to the nest.  Dora quickly returned and tried to scare the squirrel away, but it wasn't afraid and taunted her from the middle of the tree.

In the photo below, you can see that Dora can't really maneuver between all the tiny branches to get at the squirrel. The squirrel is likely one of many who live in that tree and are very territorial.  I previously expressed my misgivings about this nest location, mostly because hawks and squirrels cannot live a few feet away from each other and not have problems.



About a second after I took the above photo, Christo came zooming in from behind me as fast as a bullet.  He struck the squirrel and knocked it out of the tree.  The squirrel fell 50-60 feet to the ground where, fortunately, there was a thick layer of snow that cushioned the fall and the squirrel survived.

On Sunday, while Christo was brooding in the nest, a squirrel (I don't know if it was the same one from the day before) climbed right up the side of the nest and looked inside.  Christo exploded out of the nest, but he had been facing the other way, so had to twist around 180 degrees to chase after the squirrel.



If Christo had been facing the other way, I don't think the squirrel would have escaped.



Although they are prey for hawks, squirrels can also inflict injury.  They have razor sharp teeth and the Tompkins squirrels seem to have no fear and a whole lot of attitude.  I worry about them hurting the hawks as much as I worry about them being turned into lunch.  Last week, I was concerned about a mark on Dora's face which, if it was an injury (we were never able to figure it out), could have come from an encounter with a squirrel.

She seems to be fine now.  Below are some photos of her from Sunday.










In other hawk news, I was heartbroken today to learn of the passing of Ezra, the male red-tailed hawk who was featured on Cornell's live hawk cam along with is mate, Big Red.  Ezra and Big Red were the first hawks I ever watched on camera and they really got me interested in red-tails and other raptors.  As they were the first pair I followed, they will always be special to me and I really appreciate everyone at Cornell for sharing them with the world.  I learned so much from them and they have helped me to better understand and appreciate Christo and Dora.