Red-tailed Nest Tree
"Big Mama" and "Junior", Green-Wood Cemetery's resident Red-tailed Hawk pair have lost their favorite nest tree.
Beginning in 2007, the pair built their nest near the top of a mature Littleleaf Linden tree. It is a towering tree, probably close to 80 feet in height. They continued building on that nest over a 4 year period. They had added so much material to the nest over that time that by last year it looked more like an eagle nest than a Red-tailed Hawk nest. When Hurricane Irene hit in 2011 I assumed that the winds would knock it out of the tree. These hawks are such great engineers, however, that the nest remained intact, although it was listing to one side. I presume that is why the pair decided to give that spot a break and instead constructed a new nest in a nearby cedar. While visiting the cemetery over the weekend I discovered that their linden tree at the intersection of Linden and Atlantic Avenues was toppled by Hurricane Sandy
The photo above was taken early in the year in 2007. This is what it looks like now:
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2 comments:
We spent many happy hours observing Big Mama & Jr and their offspring in that tree. It deeply saddens me about the loss of that beautiful mature tree in addition to hundreds of others within Green-Wood due to Hurricane Sandy. Lets hope we dont have to witness that event again in our ifetime.
Marge Raymond
Hi there. I live in Toronto, Canada, and recently, my wife, Jean, and I came upon an adult Red-tailed Hawk in Markham, Ontario. We have read that stalking a hawk is no easy task,that you have to sneak up on them when they are looking the other way. Well, this Hawk was only looking one way when it landed, and that was right at us! Fortunately, we had our camera with us and got some good pictures and video. We have posted them for anyone interested at: http://frametoframe.ca/photo-essay-red-tailed-hawk-sighting-markham-ontario
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