11/29, Enjoying the Sunset Together

Twenty stories up at the Douglass Houses at 4:10 p.m., or 19 minutes before official sunset. The duo went to roost about 4:20.

11/11, Isolde?

Manhattan Ave. at 103rd St., 4:10 p.m. This adult red-tail was just finishing off dinner, and after a beak wipe on the edge of the roof, took off to roost for the night, perhaps somewhere near the Central Park Pool.

This makes only the sixth definite sighting I've made of a free red-tail since mid-June. Four, including the above, were in the Douglass Houses or very close by. A fifth, on Labor Day, was down by the Soldiers and Sailors Monument and was either the Boat Basin baby or one of its parents. The sixth was perched on the Cardinal Cooke health center chimney, on the far side of Central Park, in early October.

Other than that, throw in a pair of kestrels who were in the Douglass Houses in early September, a couple other sightings of kestrels around St. John's cathedral, and several osprey fishing high mountain lakes when I went backpacking in August.

7/19, Bandshell Hawk

As I skated off the 72nd St. transverse and onto the walkway leading to Central Park's bandshell, angry robin chirping stopped me dead in my tracks. I wondered if one of the owls from yesterday's rehab release had flown across the lake. But no, it was a red-tailed hawk. It quickly shifted to a tree closer to the Summer Stage — a music lover — where it stayed for the next 20-30 minutes despite the continued efforts of a pair of robins to chase it off.

Of course, with Central Park red-tails, a common question is, who is it?

Well, the bandshell is probably in Palemale and Lola's territory, but it was quickly apparent that this hawk had light irises. It must be a young visitor. Indeed, a closer look at the two pictures above revealed that although most of the hawk's tail was adult red with light transverse barring, it still had a couple of its baby brown tail feathers. So it's a 15-month old.

The hawk did a lot of head-bobbing as it cased the joint for mice and what-not foraging in the undergrowth, but it also tried some occasional preening. The robins seemed to have figured out that the latter were good times to divebomb the hawk.

The hawk occasionally eyed the people around too. With irritation.

And elsewhere.