Astoria Park Update

It turns out Athena, the female Red-tailed Hawk from the Astoria Park nest who passed away 2 weeks ago did not die from being struck by a car, it turns out rat poison was the culprit. She was the victim of rat poison once before in 2007, but thankfully she was found in time and brought to rehabilitators Bobby and Cathy Horvath who saved her life (you can view an article in the Daily News about it here). After Athena died her mate Atlas was left to incubate the eggs for himself and feed himself as well. The eggs need to be kept at 100 degrees Fahrenheit till they hatch and turned 180 degrees twice a day. This would have been an impossible task for any bird, so the decision was made to retrieve the eggs from the nest so Atlas could go on with his life and the eggs would have a chance at hatching successfully. Three eggs were retrieved on 3-31-10 at around 7:30 P.M. thanks to the FDNY Ladder 117 in Astoria. They are incubating now in the hands of rehabilitator Bobby Horvath (the Daily News covered this story as well, you can read it here). Atlas was fortunate enough to find a new mate rather quickly and if we are real lucky the 3 eggs Athena laid may hatch and continue her legacy.