Sometime late last night or early this morning the surviving nestling fledged to the rear of the nearby St. Cornelius Chapel. It spent the afternoon in the gutters of the chapel. The mother visited twice while I was there, bring prey on the second trip. Both parent made flights by the church to check on the fledgling.

It was great to see that the fledgling had safely made it off the nest. Fledge days can be dangerous, and thankfully this one wasn’t. May this fledgling have a safe and uneventful time this summer on the island.

Saturday was a lot of fun at Governors Island. The surviving eyass was incredibly active and looked ready to fledge a number of times. It had a long tail, which seems to be the last thing to grow in, was actively jumping around the railings of the fire escape and the parents were leaving food up on the gutter of the building enticing it to leave.

Sadly, one of the eyasses died this past week. The remaining eyass looks good and may fledge within a week. I didn’t have much time to spend at the nest site but the nestling should start jumping up and down to the railing soon.

A week later and they continue to get bigger! Not a lot of action, but I did get good looks at the not so little ones.

The Governors Island nest looked good when I visited on Saturday. The mother spent most of the time off the nest watching it from a flagpole on the nearby church, and the young ones spent most of their time napping. I didn’t spend much time at the nest, as I went to look for the Pileated Woodpecker that visited the island this weekend.

I went back to Governors Island on Sunday, and saw what things were like with “The Yard”, a playground was open. The kids were noisy, but ignored the hawks and the hawks ignored them. But as the kids get bigger, everyone should keep away from the nest to avoid getting pooped on!

There was a report of a child throwing things at the hawks and yelling for it to go away a few days ago. It might be best to close the play tower near the nest early June, when the hawks will have left the nest. The Yard is huge and closing off a small section wouldn’t be difficult.

The mother is banded, and I’ll send off her band number to the USGS in a few days.