Amy P., who I ran into at Trader Joe's. I don't have your right email address to forward you the invite to the pot luck. Hildy

Sited a red tail at 5:45pm on the roof of the building on the corner of Moulton and Concord. The one time I didn't bring my binoculars[Murphy's Law] while walking in the area because I was doing errands in the mall. I believe it was an adult because the chest was white with a few brown feathers. Perhaps Lucy, since Sara from the condos saw her around 1 o'clock near the nest at 185. Hildy

The Hawks made me do it. Sunday, August 15th from 3:30PM until??
*** See Picasa Link below report ***

While on vacation, I received an e-mail from Paul Roberts, requesting some history about the Red Tail nest opposite the Shell station that got blown away with part of the tree last October. For three years prior to that. I watched the Hawks and chicks from various parking lots at the bank, behind the Shell station, and from what is now the new shopping mall parking lot at CVS.
Early this afternoon, I responded to Paul's e-mail indicating that at this time my life is so busy. I'm not sure when I will have time to check out the new nest that the Hawks were apparently building opposite the Shell station. On the way back to my house, from shopping at Whole Paycheck at the Fresh Pond Mall I pulled into the Bank of America parking lot and took out my binoculars to see if I could locate this new nest. I spent about 10 minutes scanning the trees from various places with no luck, and was about to pack it in when I noticed a very large Hawk sitting on a branch in the very tree that used to house the nest. This was a large hawk and had me wondering if this was one of the juveniles. Lucy, in particular because of the size of the Hawk' s chest.
About five minutes after this wonderful discovery and still trying to figure out which hawk it was Amy showed up being led by her German Shepherd. Amy returned with her binoculars and for the next 15 to 20 minutes we're trying to figure out was a hawk Larry or Lucy – definitely not Lucky. I left the parking lot behind the Shell station walked out the street corner by the Shell sign and spotted the nest that Amy had pointed out to me. From that same position I had a clear view of the Hawk in the other tree. Still couldn't figure out which one it was. At one point from the parking lot behind the Shell station Amy thought she caught a glimpse of some red in the tail. I walked over behind Bank of America to the other side of it and was able to see the back of a hawk, which clearly had a red tail. So much for thinking it was one of the juveniles. Now the question was, what Hawk was this. It was deftly not Ruby because it didn't have the yellow eyes. It was hard to tell whether it was Buzz, because no band was evident. We clearly needed something more powerful than binoculars to try and solve the mystery. I thought for sure it was another Hawk other than Buzz or Ruby. For me it was something about the head coloring that didn't look like Buzz's head.
Amy left and I left. Except the Hawks made me do it. I live just up the street on Concord Avenue in Belmont. Went to my house got my camera and my scope. Checked out my Buzz photos for markings. If it is Buzz it needs to have a yellow spot at the top of the beak. Then I returned to the Shell station. (I never buy Shell gas). Sure enough, the Hawk was still there and I grab some real fast photographs both front and back. Then I set up my scope was able to clearly see the features of this Hawk. It certainly had the yellow top of the beak that Buzz had. And a pair of what I call a striped yellow whiskers coming back from the beak to just under the eye. I don't remember whisker like feature on viewing my photos of Buzz.
Well, the mystery was finally solved. While peering through my scope at 80 power the Hawk decided to relieve itself and stood tall on its legs to do so, revealing the band. The Buzz band.
So much for my no time to check out Hawks.

Larry

See more photos frm Larry and Ernie:

http://picasaweb.google.com/117015767935538270468/BlumsackSpotsBuzz#

Educational video about Red-tails. Very well done. 5 minutes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McIg8fT4mck&feature=fvw

Paul Robert's Report: July 31, 2010

It’s a testament to good luck, dumb luck, perseverance, or an obstreperous driver who I first thought didn’t know how to drive in a very small, tight, parking lot… or all of the above.

On Saturday July 31, around 6 a.m. I drove over to Cambridgepark Drive to look for Red-tailed Hawks, possibly the Alewife birds, but more likely other Redtails that might have nested in the area. At least one adult and two juveniles had been seen and photographed in the area over the past two months. We – and the photographers - questioned if those might be the Alewife Redtails, just over on the other side of the B&M tracks. The photos showed conclusively that, with one possible exception, the Redtails photographed on the other side of the tracks were from the other side of the tracks.

I didn’t see any Redtails in Cambridgepark this morning, but it was a gorgeous, cool morning with a northeast wind. Sunny, low humidity, and temperatures in the low 60s. A cold front had arrived Thursday night, bringing in cool, much drier Canadian air on Friday and now Saturday. It was actually chilly last night. My wife pulled up the sheet when she went to bed, rather than complaining how humid and uncomfortable it was. As Susan Moses, said, it was like a fall day.

Seeing nothing, I drove over to Alewife Hawk territory, Buzz & Ruby’s neighborhood, and slowly drove an ever-expanding circle, looking for adults and hopefully one or more of the three amigos. Nada. I drove around again, doubling my earlier results. NADA. I pulled into the CVS parking lot to do Concord Ave on foot, and look for the “new” nest, but again I saw nothing. I was pulling out of the lot at about 7 a.m. to proceed home when someone blocked by egress. Whoever it was apparently wanted to turn left, into the narrow driveway where I was, but they didn’t leave much – maybe not even adequate - room for me to pull out into the lane they were in. What in the !@@!!$$&*. I was looking into the morning light, so didn’t recognize Lynda Niedringhaus, who had recognized me and wanted me to stop. I started to pull out and recognized her as we passed c-l-o- s-e-l-y, and saw Susan Moses with her. We backed up and parked and got out and talked. (Thanks, Lynda! I’d never have seen the following if it hadn’t been for you flagging me down!) Suddenly, Susan spotted a Redtail flying from behind us towards the CVS sign, carrying something. We started to run over, with Leika arriving with her videocam. The hawk was on the CVS sign, but then flew and proceeded directly to the nest at #185 Alewife Brook Parkway, carrying an oak twig with several green leaves. For the first time I know of since Lucy had given up the mothership at the crack of dawn on June 7, Dad – Buzz - landed in the nest with his stick and proceeded to decorate it. We were flabbergasted! And then we heard some pedestrian on the other side of the parkway yelling. It was Ernie Sarro, with his videocam already set up, watching the same event we were. He had stopped by on his way to work and stumbled across this totally unexpected event.

Buzz put his stick in the nest and stood there, admiring his handiwork while the shocked humans below realized that there were OTHER green branches in the nest. Fresh green leaves that had to have been delivered this morning! Overall, the nest looked like some independent carpenter had been called in to “improve” the old homestead. The nest was a little higher and more “together,” “tighter,” though Susan was still really bothered by the long stick dangling down in front of the nest looking like a rip chord. This was the first time I had ever seen Buzz land at the nest with a stick and not see Ruby, who always before would watch patiently and then put the stick where it was really supposed to go. (Males just don’t have clue, do they…. This seems to be as true for Redtails as it does for Ospreys!) Buzz then flew up to one of the girders at the northern end of #185, like he had in the good old days. Eventually, Buzz ended up flying back towards the kids’ old playground, going just south of the #185 building.

We walked back behind CVS/Trader Joes and into the old nursery, looking for Buzz. Suddenly, a large white feather floated to the ground from the top of a fairly large, tall tree. Leika picked it up. White as a gull’s, at least on one side, and large. As large as a goose primary. I turned it over and saw it was lightly barred a soft brown on one side of the shaft; light brown, and much more heavily worn on the other. A flight feather. Looked like a large secondary from a right wing. The feather had not just materialized from thin air and dropped from the tree like overripe fruit. Was the hawk in that tree? It had to be. Four people walked around and looked. Nope. No one could see any hawk, though some House Sparrows were going into the tree and chattering, and a family of recently fledged House Sparrows was in a nearby small, dying tree in the parking lot, chattering away. Susan was still suspicious, but the hawk still wasn’t there…. Nonetheless, Buzz exploded out of the tree where it had been invisible and landed on a much smaller, not too healthy tree where he began trying to rip a branch off the tree. He flapped awkwardly, in unbalanced fashion, as he tried to break off another branch to take to the nest. This was what we had seen a week ago Thursday, when Buzz had “landed” in a tree but tried to take off with a branch in his talons, breaking the branch off the tree by sheer force of his lift. Here he was quickly frustrated and gave up, flying east towards the parkway with empty “hands.”

We followed him over to #185 again. There was the expected hawk sitting on a girder. But wait, several called out that was Buzz, and it looked to have dark eyes. Then someone pointed out a large hawk sitting on the farthest corner of the closest Rindge Avenue Apartment building. Could that be Ruby? No, from my angle and the sunlight, I saw the close bird had yellow eyes. The close bird was RUBY, who was into heavy molt. She looked like someone the cat had dragged in, fluffed out and feathers awry! Dowdy. She leapt into the air but landed on the corner of the building, and Buzz, the mild mannered hawk otherwise known as Clark Kent, landed on a girder behind her. The THIRD Retail was still sitting on the Rindge Avenue apartment building.

In fact, Ruby and Buzz sat on the northeast corner of Shire Pharmaceuticals facing the unknown hawk on Rindge Avenue, the sun reflecting brightly off their white breasts, even though Ruby looked like she had forgotten to add the fabric softener when she had cleaned her plumage that morning. She sat there absolutely gorgeous in her homeliness, one large talon raised and clenched in front of her breast. Relaxed. Confident. Buzz, whose molt was not nearly as far advanced, looked sleek and elegant, and much smaller than his mate. And that is was this was all about. Apparently another Redtail from who knows where, maybe a second-year floater, had been in the area and was now perched on the Rindge Apartment, the same spot where we had often seen Buzz and Ruby perched, and from where they could keep a sharp eye on the movements of their three kids. The building over which they had often soared and even kited. My guess is that the intruder was a female. She was large at a distance, and Ruby was the hawk sitting out in front of her smaller, snazzier mate. Ruby was sending a message to the distant Redtail. No texting. No Internet. No cell phone. No smoke signals. But still the message was clear. The #185 nest had been decorated for the first time since early June. It had been “replastered” and a fresh coat of paint (greens) added to the nest. This nest was obviously owned and being actively maintained, and ANY itinerant hawk should know and recognize this, or ignore it at their own peril. Buzz and Ruby sat there for more than half an hour, showing that “possession is nine tenths of the law.” No aggressive flights towards the intruder. Just walk softly and carry a big stick.

[NOTE: Briefly, a lot of adult hawks who were not mated this past year, and perhaps those who mated unsuccessfully, are floaters, looking for a potential mate and/or nest site at any time. (Subadults can form a large part of this pool as well.) It appears as though a mated hawk can be challenged for its mate and its nest site at almost anytime in the year, including in the middle of nesting and raising young. A pair that has nested successfully, like Buzz and Ruby, is more likely to remain together and resist the interloper. If a pair has nested successfully for several years, they are even more likely to remain together. But, as in human bondings, NOTHING is a given. This process works well for the birds, because it facilitates a bird that has lost a mate due to death or injury, or “transgressions,” finding a replacement relatively quickly when a replacement mate is urgently needed, or finding an “upgrade” spouse if the previous mate was not able to lay or provide food successfully. I do not know how long Buzz and Ruby have been a pair, but they are maintaining as few as two and as many as five nests, and have demonstrated some very moving bonding behavior over the past several months. Their sky dancing – aerial duetting - after Lucy fledged was spectacular. Today was another strong demonstration of bonding, of solidarity. Just remember that nothing is as given.]

Suddenly, Ruby leapt off the edge of the building and parachuted into the grass about 15 yards down slope from us. She came up with a something in her talons, and flew to a building in the power substation. It at first looked like she had just grabbed a clump of weeds, one streaming out behind her, but two of us had seen something more substantial. We first thought it might be a large insect, dwarfed by the weed, but she dropped the weed and started eating a small rodent, almost certainly a mouse, as we could see a tiny gastro-intestinal track being yanked from its moorings. She ate it quickly and cleanly. Nothing left. One, then a second, mockingbird appeared and began to dive bomb Ruby. She hopped after one, who was smart enough to flee, and then Ruby took off towards the playground.

The third Redtail had disappeared. One Mocker landed and walked along the edge of the girder towards Buzz. Shades of the Mockingbird that had walked up to and challenged Buzz on the CVS sign almost three months ago; the Mockingbird that shortly thereafter was served up as a meal to the three amigos.

These Mockers harassed Buzz, and one dive-bombed and physically hit Buzz several times. These gray, robin-sized birds acted like small jump jets attacking a Boeing747 just sitting there. They are courageous. Maybe foolhardy. But they are very territorial, defending their breeding territory from this behemoth who would never give a second thought to taking one of the gray birds as an entrée.

The Redtail was playing the territorial game as well, but its major threat was no longer visible, at least to us, and the Mockers’ major threat was sitting right there. They continued to harass him, until Buzz left and flew towards the playground, followed by the two jets harassing him from behind and above. (These two Mockingbirds followed Buzz at least 100 yards and remained to harass him and Ruby.)

We walked back to the playground again. Nada. But Susan, who is very astute, thought she saw some movement in a lower tree. Buzz? No. Ruby, pulling a small branch off a small tree in the parking lot median strip, and being harassed by a Blue Jay and by more vociferous Mockingbirds until she took off and disappeared low to the north, carrying the frail thin branch. Action in another tree. Buzz, also being harassed, and trying to rip a branch from his small tree. He got one and took off, to the north. As he did so, Leika spied Ruby sitting on a light post behind a wall of trees, holding a thin young, fresh branch. Ruby took off as well and both hawks, each carrying a very small thin stick, flew into the middle of a large pine tree that seemed to swallow them up. Shortly thereafter, we saw them both sitting in the center of the tree facing each other. The twigs were no longer in their beaks.

OMG! Those twigs they had carried into the stately white pine tree were not “bricks” for the foundation of a new nest. They were wisps of branches; finishing touches – accessories. Could they already have built a nest in the pine? The answer is yes. They could have, but we could not see one. Their behavior, including how they were standing facing each other around an opening, strongly suggests there is a nest in the pine. That means they have worked on at least two and as many as possibly five nests in the past week, with the clear aim to be showing active occupancy at each nest.

We did not see any of the kids today. None were hanging around begging Mom or Dad for food because they had failed to find enough on their own. Buzz and Ruby were not seen investing any time in searching for their kids or finding food for them. Buzz, Ruby , and the “three amigos” teach me something new every day. The “change in tone” I noted for them last week has become a well-known Fleetwood Mac song: “DON’T STOP thinking about tomorrow….”

Best,

Paul

Ernie's Comment: Check out the video of Buzz plopping in the 185 nest this morning (unedited):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQb_MktCWdg

Paul M. Roberts
Medford, MA
phawk254@comcast.net

Paul Robert's Report: July 29, 2010

A week or two ago Hildy forwarded a photo link from Ellen Maas showings a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk photographed on Cambridgepark Drive. Several responded that their impressions were that it was not one of the 185 — our -- birds.

I was not as certain and inquired around for other possible photos. I struck gold this week. I received two additional sets of photos from different people on Cambridgepark. I don't have all the info I would like but I can say categorically that most of the photos are definitely NOT of the 185 birds.

I received a set of photos of an adult, probably male, dark-eyed, without any band, and with very different markings on the neck and upper breast than Buzz or Ruby. NO way they are the same. I received a second set from another source of a fresh juvenile so incredibly heavily marked that one could question if it is a Redtail! It is a redtail, but I’ve never seen even a photo of a juvenile like this. No confusion whatsoever on this bird. There is a third photo of a large immature, which I would guess to be a female. It is possibly Lucy, but I don’t think so. There is a fourth set of photos by Joe Rodricks. The bird is a juvenile that is not Larry and no Lucy. It could conceivably be Lucky, but I doubt it.

I still have some more analysis to do here, but several things seem clear:

1. A pair of Red-tailed Hawks nested at 185 Alewife Brook Parkway and raised three young that fledged successfully.
2. Another pair of Red-tailed Hawks nested at or more likely near Cambridgepark Drive. They successfully fledged at least 1, probably 2, young.
3. The adult was photographed on June 22, perched on a railing. The juveniles were photographed in early July, one sitting on a ledge, but most sitting on the edge of the buildings.
4. Buzz and Ruby frequently perched on the Rindge Ave apartments and soared south and east of, and over, them. I never saw them soar over Cambridgepark, nor did I see one of the adults from Cambridgepark perched on a Rindge building. It looks like the B&M tracks and Alewife Brook were important territorial boundaries for the two nesting pairs. Buzz and Ruby could see virtually all their nesting territory from high atop Rindge, and could keep an eye on the Cambridgepark birds.
5. I never saw any of our Red-tailed Hawks fly across the B&M tracks into Cambridgepark.
6. Last week several of us saw an adult Redtail perch on the roof edge of a Cambridgepark office building, but could not identify the individual. My guess is that it was one of the CP adults, not one of our (AB) birds.
7. When nesting, I think Redtails are pretty territorial. I’ve seen many a “foreigner” pass over someone else’s nest or nearby nesting territory, but they have to be HIGH, clearly not hunting and posing a possible threat. I saw a large adult female coming out of the southwest several times while the chicks were in the nest and fly high above 185 without aggravating our parents, one or both of whom were at the nest several of the times. (At one point no AB adult was visible when the interloper flew over 185.

I need to do some more work trying to track dates, specific locations, for the photos and for cataloging them, but there is no doubt in my mind that there was another nesting pair not too far away, on the other side of the tracks.

Best,

Paul

Paul M. Roberts
Medford, MA
phawk254@comcast.net

Paul Robert's Report: July 22, 2010

On Thursday morning July 22 a small party of intrepid (a euphemism for “bordering on crazy”) Red-tailed Hawk Watchers set out at 5 a.m., literally at the crack of dawn, to discover if Buzz was still feeding the kids. We were wondering because observers have not been seeing him feed the three amigos at typical times, between 5:30 or 6 and 8 a.m.

A day or two earlier I had commented that earlier this spring I had assumed that a male Redtail feeding chicks in the nest would start hunting at dawn, well before sunrise. There are several reasons for that. One, some of the prey is crepuscular – on the edge between nocturnal and diurnal, so it is an optimal time to hunt. You also don’t have shadows to possibly alert prey (though that is a minor issue). Most important, after a moderately long night the kids can be quite hungry, so one might expect the most hunting activity early in the day, especially with three little beaks to fill. (Typically, early in the day is therefore the best time to see hawk activity.)

I was surprised in May, however, to NOT see Buzz bringing in food around or shortly after sunrise. Jane Myers intentionally went well before sunrise several times expecting to see Buzz pushing a cart full of fresh food from Whole Foods, including sides of squirrel, chipmunk steaks, and starling stew, over to 185. Buzz brought in nada early on those days. I went in before sunrise several days and had the same experience. I thought it possible that Buzz brought in some food right around dawn, but I saw no sign that the chicks were resting after eating, which would be normal behavior. What I heard from other observers was that Buzz did bring in a load of food in the evening, and that those were often larger prey, squirrels, etc., some of which were not eaten that night but were left in the nest and nibbled on the next morning.

I concluded that Buzz was apparently not typical (horrors), and was probably more of an evening hunter. He clearly brought in more late in the day than early in the day. What we saw after the chicks had fledged was consistent with this. Fledglings were calling in the morning, around 6-8 a.m., not sated by early food deliveries from Dad or Mom. However, little or no parental feeding had been seen for some days, so we wanted to check out if the chicks were being fed earlier.

We did not see a single chick in 2 hours. We did discover an adult Red-tailed Hawk sitting on a business complex on the north side of the Boston and Maine tracks. Could that be Buzz? Or Ruby? A good question that we couldn’t answer, but we’ve never seen them in that area before (though they often soar over and perch on the Rindge Avenues apartments east of there.) Intriguingly, we’ve heard reports that at least three Redtails (presumably juveniles) had been seen over on Cambridge Park Drive, and we received a photo of one of the juveniles that most people doubt was one of “our three.” I need to look at the photo more closely and follow up on some leads I’ve received regarding the “birds from the other side of the tracks.”

Not seeing any kids in the usual areas, increasingly typical for almost two weeks, we were wondering if they had all dispersed to a much larger territory. A Redtail was heard calling from near Neville Manor, but we never saw it and could not identify it, though some were thinking it was Lucky.

Around 5:45 we had an adult Redtail explode out of a tree across Concord Ave. from the Shell Station. It disappeared into the woods along the reservation.

About 6:30, we saw an adult Redtail in a tree across from the Shell Station again. Susan first thought it was carrying large prey in its talons. We then saw it take off into the woods. Almost immediately thereafter we saw a Redtail land really awkwardly in another tree along Concord Avenue. It had to be a kid. The bird couldn’t stand up straight on the branch and was flapping its wings just trying to keep its balance. This was awfully clumsy for a young hawk that had been flying around and landing in trees for almost two months now. Well, it wasn’t a kid. It was an adult! Buzz! And he wasn’t landing. He was flapping around trying to rip a dead branch off the very tall tree! He tore the branch off and carried it back to a large maple tree across form the Shell Station. He was building or maintaining a nest!

He then flew off to the tree he had just pruned and was joined by another Redtail. One of the kids? Were the adults teaching the kids how to build a nest? No. The other Redtail was Ruby, who was perhaps quietly commenting on the branches Buzz was selecting and ripping from their moorings. Whatever she was doing there, Ruby was not breaking off branches or carrying them back to the nest in the maple. Buzz ripped off two more branches and carried them back, followed by Ruby each time. Not much time was spent at the “old” nest (not 185), reworking the latticework. Over half an hour we saw Buzz take at least three good-sized sticks back to the nest and probably four! These were not leafy branches, greens. These were fairly large, dead branches. Foundation sticks. These guys weren’t worried about feeding the hungry, pleading kids. They were looking ahead to next year.

Ruby left the tree and flew over to the corner of Raytheon’s tallest office building, perching briefly on the far corner before setting off further west. Buzz followed her a few minutes later, making the same stop and angle of departure. Were they going off to find, keep track of, or feed the kids, who are now clearly ranging farther in their daily activities? We don’t know. No kids were seen by the observers Thursday morning. But normal, healthy, behavior would have the chicks ranging farther afield and taking some or almost all of their food on their own by now.

Clearly, Buzz and Ruby had been reworking a nest. This is likely the very nest in which they (or possibly Buzz and another mate) had successfully raised and fledged young in 2009, or a replacement for that nest that they had reconstructed this winter. (There is one report that the nest they had used at or very near that location in 2009 had blown down in October, but there WAS a Redtail nest in the tree across from the Shell station this April! If a nest had blown down, they had reconstructed it.) There is another Redtail nest near Lusitania Field, from which Buzz extracted at least several branches early this spring to help build the 185 nest. That is likely another nest Buzz (and possibly Ruby) used in raising young a year or two earlier. Whatever, there are at least three Red-tailed Hawk nests within several hundreds yards between Fresh Pond and 185 Alewife.

Earlier this week Buzz sat on the familiar CVS sign, his favorite perch for much of this spring, as the sun set spectacularly behind 185. He wasn’t looking at 185, however. He was facing Fresh Pond Reservation, across from the Shell Station. Perhaps he was looking into the future.

Paul

Ernie's Comment:
Check out this Picasa photo site to see possible location. Alex at the Shell station said this is the spot. George, who manages the Shell station, told PHAWK he has been following Red-tails in the trees across from the station for 13 years:

http://picasaweb.google.com/ErnieVPFS/ShellStationNestAtCircle#

July 27th, 2010 by ernievpfs