5/6, Norman v. the Kestrel, Plus Egrets

I missed hawkwatching on Monday, but James reported more feeding activity at the cathedral red-tail nest. So indeed, there's at least one nestling up there. But it's likely to be a week or two before we can see if there's more than one.

On Tuesday, I arrived at the nest area at the cathedral at 5:30, followed a few moments later by the hawk papa Norman. He flew in from the north and alit on the north side of the nest.

Possibly he delivered food, but I didn't get a good look at him while he was still in the air. He hung about for a minute or two, checking the nest and looking around. When I crossed the street for a better view, it first looked like he left and the nest was empty, but a moment later he dove out of the south side of the nest and headed off toward Central Park.

There being no signs of a feeding about to commence, I wandered into Morningside Park and found two great egrets at the pond. Apparently they weren't friends, because when Egret Two flew over to where Egret One was stalking in the shallows, Egret One took off...

...and landed on one of the trees on the island...

...where it stayed for the nest 5-10 minutes.

Meanwhile, I realized something large was flying around over toward Douglas and 112th St. Looks like Norman. But using bins and then the zoom on the camera, I realized he was being harassed by a smaller bird, likely a kestrel since there's supposed to be a kestrel nest in that area.

Indeed, pix revealed it was kestrel. Further, a close look at pix revealed that Norman was carrying fresh-caught prey. Hmmm, maybe he snagged something near the kestrel nest.

The two circled around, getting higher and higher.

And higher and higher. The kestrel dropped off, but Norman kept going, and further away. I finally lost track of him when he was just a dark speck a few hundred feet up somewhere beyond Douglass Circle.

Well, not much going on with the egrets at the park, and light on the pond is about gone, so back up to check the red-tail nest. Ooops, should have headed up here sooner. There's a feeding going on. Perhaps Norman brought food when he was here at 5:30, as I didn't see him heading back this way after the kestrel chase.

But all one can see at this point is Isolde's feathery rear end sticking up over St. Andrew's head.

Isolde wrapped up the feeding at 6:05, and then hovered on the edge of the nest for a minute or two.

Before plopping down in there, out of sight.