Early Monday evening revealed only one baby hawk in the nest at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, with checks from multiple vantage points all failing to show any other sibs up there.
But it took a while to figure where the other two baby hawks were at. No one was begging for food or attention, and the other area birds were fairly quiet. Finally, some slightly excited robin chipping suggested there might be a hawk near the Cathedral School. Moments later, a fledgling flew over, traveling from the school to the chapel rooftops around the cathedral apse.
The fledging lurked at the base of the cross atop St. Savior chapel for a bit, then disappeared briefly, only to re-appear atop the cross.
It mostly stayed there for the next half hour, disappearing once or twice elsewhere on the chapel rooftops before returning to the cross.
Meanwhile the remaining nestling remained alert, watching the skies above and the rooftops below. A couple times it got excited.
But what of the third baby hawk? It turned out it also been lurking on the school roof, perhaps in a gutter where it wasn't easily spotted. But it finally popped into view, trying to climb the edge of the roof.
We've seen this before. The kid gets partway up and then loses traction. Sure enough.
It managed to stay put very briefly.
And then back down to the eave.
Which it decided was a good enough place to spend some time and preen.
All three young hawks were in the nest late Saturday afternoon, just before the thunderstorm. Whether the two fledged on Sunday or Monday, I can't say. But they did so pretty much on schedule. First observation of their mother behaving like there might have been a hatch was on May 17, and Sunday marked 46 days after that date.
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