New Red-tail in Green-Wood Cemetery?

On Wednesday I took a quick ride over to Green-Wood Cemetery ... and, "No", I didn't find the you-know-what. Marge and I did come across a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk that neither of us recognized.

We spotted the young bird perched near the top of a pine tree on Ocean Avenue. He was a couple of feet below the top and almost hidden by the tree's needles. Like the adult named Ralph from Prospect Park, this bird had very pale head feathers. I looked through my photos of the four offspring from Green-Wood Cemetery and Prospect Park, but they all had the typical dark heads. As I took photos of the hawk, we noticed Big Mama her mate, Junior, soaring high above the cemetery. The young hawk saw them, as well, and nervously watched them from his discreet perch. Perhaps they had tried to chase him from their territory earlier in the day.

I started to think about the year that Junior arrived in Prospect Park. He still had his youthful brown-banded tail feathers. Big Mama was in the process of building a new nest with her mate of three years, Split-tail. Junior decided to "help" and got into numerous fights with the older male hawk. Eventually, Split-tail split and Junior hooked up with Big Mama. The following year the pair moved their territory into the Green-Wood Cemetery. I wonder if this new, young bird in the cemetery is going to try and move in on Big Mama.