I took a long stroll up the Hudson side of upper Manhattan at the end of the afternoon. Despite gorgeous clear skies, hawk sightings were relatively few, and no luck at all spotting any bald eagles as others have in the area during the past few weeks.
First hawk sighting came at roughly 190th St., as a red-tail descended from the middle of Fort Tryon Park and soared out over the river, then south toward the George Washington Bridge. Unfortunately, I had the short lens on and was negotiating my way over the ice on the bikepath to take pix of the "temple" at Inspiration Point.
The next sighting came a half hour later after I exited the bikepath and was walking down Staff St. toward Inwood Hill Park. One of Inwood's resident red-tails came soaring over the top of the hill, circled twice, and then headed back north along the river. I still had the short lens on, but the circling gave me enough time to change and get a couple long-distance pix.
I walked up through Dyckman Fields and started up the trail that circles around the very north tip of the island and over to the Spuyten Duyvil side of Inwood. The red-tail had apparently been down somewhere near the railroad bridge. It popped up and soared over the trees, then perched uphill for a minute.
A big looking hawk, so my guess was that this was the Inwood mama.
As sunset got closer, she took off again, circled once and then headed over the hill toward the soccer field and the nest area. Fifteen minutes later, I found her perched on a tree perhaps 50 feet away from the nest. Over the next ten minutes, she shifted trees a couple times, and apparently went to roost in another tree about the same distance from the nest.
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