Of the eight known nests in Manhattan, here’s their status this week…

5th Avenue, nest failure.  Lola has stopped sitting on the eggs.

888 Seventh Avenue, uncertain.

St. John the Divine, feeding behavior has started, but no eyasses visible, which isn’t unusual for this nest.

Highbridge Park, two eyasses

Inwood Hill Park, three eyasses

South Riverside Park, death of three chicks.   (Updated: 5-13-08.  The necrospy at the DEC Pathology unit of one of the chicks showed acute hemorrhaging of the lungs.  This discovery makes secondary poisoning the most likely cause of death, although hypothermia is still a posibility.  Further tests will be carried out to try and identify the anticoagulant or other possible toxins.  Thank you, Lincoln Karim, for taking the chick up to Dr. Stone’s lab.)

Houston Street, three eyasses.

Shepard Hall, City College, nest is too difficult to observe to be sure.

Of the eight known nests in Manhattan, here’s their status this week…

5th Avenue, nest failure.

888 Seventh Avenue, dirty windows are making observations difficult.
4/29/08 Update from Brett. He doesn’t believe they are using 888 Seventh Avenue to nest this year, or at least not yet. (1)

St. John the Divine, feeding behavior has not started, so guesses are the female is still brooding.

Highbridge Park, eggs hatched based on feeding behavior.  Number of eyasses, at least two.  (2)

Inwood Hill Park, eggs hatched and chick sighted. Number of eyasses unknown. (2)

South Riverside Park, eggs hatched and two chick sighted. (3)

Houston Street, at least one egg has hatched out of three eggs. (4)

Shepard Hall, City College, female appears to still be brooding, but nest is difficult to observe.

(1) Brett Odom
(2) Robert Schmunk, Bloomingdale Village Blog
(3) Donna Browne, Pale Male Irregulars Blog
(4) Lincoln Karim, www.palemale.com

This week’s news is mixed.

1) The Inwood Hill female joins Lola who is already sitting on eggs.

2) A male adult hawk was picked up at Avenue D and 12th Street.  It has a foot injury, possibly from getting stuck on an Air Conditioning cage (not at the nest site).  The injury may not be major, so it may be making its way back to the Lower East Side soon.

I couldn’t find either of the LES hawks around Noon on Sunday.  The hawk that was picked up may not be from the nest site on Houston.  We’ll know in a few weeks.

3) The Highbridge nest has gotten a second look confirming that it looks abandoned.  So, we may have lost a nest site this season.

Reports are coming from Donna Browne and Richard Schmunk about fledgings. 

Donna reports that the first fledge has occurred at Fordham University in the Bronx via her blog.

Robert also has a report of a first fledge at St. John the Divine on his blog.

These early days watching new fledglings can be lots of fun.  If you have a chance, visit either location and enjoy the experience.

The eyas on 888 Seventh Avenue should be fledging soon too.  Watch for it to fly to a nearby roof sometime over the next few days.   Keep an eye on Carnegie Hall.  This may be the first stop.

If you’ve been looking at the Queen’s Hawkcam, you’ll notice that the young are close to fledging.  General wisdom is that it take between 42 and 46 days for a hawk to fledge.  I’ve tried to take a guess at what I think the Manhattan hatch dates were and calculated the approximate fledge dates.  Of course, the normal “Your mileage may vary” disclaimer applies here.

One thing I’m sure of however, is that I need to spend this Memorial Day weekend visiting Highbridge and Inwood Hill Park before it’s too late!