March 16, 2010

Ravenswood Projects and Astoria Park 3-15-10

Upon regularly seeing a Red-Tailed Hawk around the Broadway N train station, I decided to investigate the possibility of there being a nest at the nearby Ravenswood Projects in Astoria. I managed to find a single RTH atop of an old water tower in that area and took a few pictures before a murder of crows chased it off. I asked a few area residents if they knew of any nests, but no one seemed to know anything. I searched most of the projects, which turned out to be much bigger than I imagine (31 buildings over 3 acres) with no luck of finding any nest.


After Ravenswood, I decided to find out if Athena at Astoria Park had laid her eggs and was sitting on the nest. I managed to find her mate Atlas rather quickly as he was perched in a tree directly beneath the nest. I didn't see any head sticking up from the nest, so I searched around the bridge area to see if I could find Athena. I searched for about 15 minutes before returning to the nest area where I spotted Athena perched no more than two feet away from Atlas.The two stayed perched together for at least 20 minutes before Atlas descended to a lower branch to finish off some leftover from earlier in the day. No eggs yet,
but i suspect she will lay them any day now.

Atlas

Athena on the left, Atlas on the right (You can detect the size difference here somewhat)






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