The final Houston Street fledge occurred on Friday the thirteenth.  It started out with a mid-afternoon fledge, followed by the usual struggle to find the fledgling, who ended up being just across Houston street.  The young fledgling was doing well hopping from branch to branch.

In the early evening, the parents arrived with the father quickly leaving.  The mother then took a rodent and flew back and forth along the top of the school, stopping on drain pipes and air conditioners to attract the fledgling back to the school.  The fledgling soon took the hint to come north back to the school flying over Houston Street.

The fledgling crossed the road, but couldn’t gain any height nor could it find a landing spot on the school.  It tired to grab the corner of the building but it ended up gliding into the street.  Luckily, we had two quick thinking hawk watchers at the site.  Edwin who stopped traffic and Adam who picked up the bird.

Then it got difficult.  A crowd had formed and followed Adam Welz, who had picked up the hawk.  Luckily, Adam has experience with raptors where he lives in South Africa.

He needed a safe space to release the hawk, but people were crowding him and touching the hawk upsetting it.  He couldn’t release it on the ground, and had nowhere to put it.  As I went to get a cardboard box, a housing authority policeman came and took the hawk away in an animal carrier.

This nest is surely at a difficult site.  Let’s hope the policeman took the hawk to a proper facility and it gets to a rehabilitator, who can return it to the site.

As dusk fell, the mother stayed on a lamp post looking for her fledgling until it got dark, and she roosted in a nearby tree for the evening.

Update: The bird is safely with its siblings, in Bobby Horvath’s care.

Two fledglings have left the Houston Street nest and one remains.  This afternoon the mother was helping to shade the last youngster from the sun.  Hopefully, it will not be in any hurry to leave.

After about half an hour, the mother moved to an adjacent air conditioner cover.

Lincoln Karim has posted a libelous attack of Bobby Horvath, on his website, www.palemale.com about Mr. Horvath’s decision to delay the return of the first fledgling of the Lower East Side nest to the site. 

Mr. Karim paints a picture of a young hawk being tortured in captivity, as if it had been sent to Guantanamo Bay.  He states that a standard identification band was illegally placed on the bird and that Mr. Hovarth’s decision to delay the bird’s return to the site after bring it back on Monday was some premeditated game.  Mr. Karmin even says that the death of the hawk would be better than having it be under Mr. Horvath’s care.

The removal of the fledgling from the site may have been unnecessary, but once a bird is in a rehabilitator’s hands, the rehabilitator must use his or her judgment about when is the appropriate time to return the bird.  (Mr. Horvath is licensed by the State of New York, by the way.)

The old school of thought was to return a fledgling as soon as possible back to the nest site.  In urban and suburban areas, there is a new school of thought that not rushing a poorly flying fledgling back to the nest area gives a bird a better chance of survival.  Mr. Horvath follows this new school of thought and has been very successful subscribing to it. 

Just look at last year’s example.  Everyone rushed to criticize Mr. Horvath, but his choices worked out correctly.  The 888 Seventh Avenue fledgling did wonderfully after a week’s separation from her parents.

The first few days off the nest are very dangerous for a young hawk.  Especially for a hawk that could not "branch" due to the nature of its urban nest location.  The grounds of the Public Housing Projects on the Lower East Side will be more difficult than normal.  While there are a few fenced in areas, they are much smaller than the fenced in private areas you will find in Central Park.

Let’s let the licensed rehabilitator do his job without harassment.

An eyas fledged today at the Houston and Avenue D nest.  I don’t have all of the details yet but it appears the bird was taken away by police.

Fledgling problem such as this are very common in the city, when birds nest outside of parks.  Just after fledging, both young Kestrels and Red-tailed Hawks like to enjoy the ground before flying to safety in trees.

Inexperienced individuals rush to call authorities, who not knowing if the bird is injured, a premature fledge or just a newly fledged and startled bird end up removing it from its parents.

Let’s hope the youngster gets to the right individuals, who return it to the Lower East Side after a check up.

Update 6-9-08: The young hawk has been turned over to the correct individuals, who are checking its health.

All three eyasses look great.  If you look at their development, especially the feathers on their heads, you’ll see the differences in ages. 

Both parents visited the nest, and all five hawks were visible at once.   A dead adult male Red-tailed Hawk had been found in Tompkin Square Park, so there had been concerns about the adult male of this pair.  Luckily, this family seems to be doing well.

After having no luck in The Bronx, I went down to the Lower East Side.  I got to see every member of the family, and watch a feeding.