For the past several weeks we have been watching a pair of nesting red-tailed hawks across the canyon. They built a nest in a eucalyptus tree, then the female began incubating a clutch of eggs. The male would bring her food and spell for short stints on the nest, while we spied on them through the spotting scope. The phrase “eyes like a hawk” is very a propos, I found. Every time I trained the scope on her she looked right back at me through the other end. It was a little unnerving.
We first noticed chicks in the nest about two weeks ago, I think. We could see a parent eating and feeding something (presumably babies) in the nest but couldn’t see exactly what was going on. Several days ago now, the babies got big enough for us to see over the edge of the nest. They were floppy fluffy white blobs.
Today I finally got some pictures of the babies. There are two chicks in the nest, and one looks quite a bit bigger than the other. I took some photos through the scope but never managed to get even a half-way decent shot of both chicks at the same time. Here’s the best that I was able to capture today:
© Allison J. Gong
I also got lucky enough to see the female return to the nest. I think she had been perched in a tree on our side of the canyon while her mate was flying above, screaming loudly. There must have been a mid-air prey exchange that I missed.
© Allison J. Gong
The female then proceeded to tear apart whatever prey item it was, and feed it to the chicks.
If you can stomach the somewhat shaky video, I did catch about a minute-and-a-half of the feeding.
From this angle I couldn’t see if both chicks were getting fed, but they are both growing. So far these hawks are good parents!