At fly out, Flaco went to a tree with a Red-tailed Hawk who was about to go to roost. The hawk left the tree and flew south. Flaco then proceeded to hoot for a few minutes, as if to say “This tree is mine”. He then went cross the drive but eventually ended up further south.

He was relocated after about thirty minutes on a small rock. He then proceeded to catch a brown rat and eat it on the ground. After eating he went to a fence to digest his meal and then few north. We then couldn’t relocate him.

After having Flaco for most of Sunday night, on Monday we only saw him briefly after fly out.

He seemed agitated at fly out. He crossed the 96th Street road that joins with the main transverse east, and then crossed the West Drive to a high tree. He spent most of his time looking east before flying in the direction of the Tennis Courts. He then went southwest and we lost track of him. I saw him briefly about a half hour later flying north but couldn’t see where he perched.

But this is owl watching. You have good nights and bad nights.

What’s unclear is if this was just a one night change or a signal of a change in habits. He has changed his roost locations over the last week, so we could be seeing the start of a new set of hunting locations. Or it could have just been an off night.

Watching owls takes patience, but most importantly it requires you to do your best to stay out of the owl’s way. After six months, I wouldn’t say Flaco trusts me, but he does seem to know he can ignore me!

Tonight, after a noisy crowd that came to watch the fly out dispersed, Flaco was able to catch his first rodent. Then he sat on one of his favorite branches for what seemed like forever. At this point the other owl watchers, even the hard core ones, gave up on him and went home.

To my delight, and maybe because I was by myself, he then gave me over two hours of close looks in a brightly lit area. He spent over on hour on a fence near to a lamp post and hunted three more times. He only got interrupted three times, once by someone walking their dog, and twice by police cars. I did my best to keep my distance, but twice he flew very close to me.

I had a wonderful time with him on Sunday night. I’ve included a short video of him eating one rodent, most likely a White-footed Mouse. On the longer video, the rodents are at 1:19, 2:50, 10:10 and 13:40. 

I had dinner before coming to the park, so I missed his fly out from a new roost tree. But I did get to see him get his dinner. On some nights he’s been eating small rodents, most likely White-footed Mice or juvenile Brown Rats which he eats whole. Tonight it was a mature Brown Rat. These take some time to eat.

He hunted from his favorite branch, and picked at the rat on the ground before flying off to a nearby tree. He was hot after flying, paused to cool down and then ate the rat. Once he got it to a smaller size, he ate what was left in a single gulp.

After finishing, he went to a tree over looking a path, and then flew east. We couldn’t find him again.

The afternoon’s rain stopped just before fly out. However, Flaco made it difficult to follow him on Thursday night. There was a mist in the air and he changed up his habits from the last few days. He seemed to stay near his roost site before going south much longer than normal. We lost track of him during this period for over an hour. I wondered if he needed to dry out before making any long flights.

He did reappear perching briefly on a bridge and then a tree. But we then lost him again.

But evenings like this are to be expected owl watching. Tracking an owl in Central Park isn’t easy!

Tonight started off slow, and then go interesting. Flaco flew out fairly normally, making a few hops in his roost American Elm before flying out. But then he quickly moved away from the nest.

I picked him up going to a bunch of London Plane trees but lost track of him. We looked for him in his normal perches but couldn’t find him. It turned out he had never left the London Planes and was in a lower brach on one of them!

He stayed on the branch for what seemed like hours, but certainly wasn’t. From there he led us to a fence, the roof of the Tennis Court building, a lawn, then Bridge No. 28, back to his preferred lawn where he perched on a tree and then caught a rat on the lawn. After awhile he then went to his favorite perch of the last few weeks.