SOME AMUSING CORRESPONDENCE

Tues, Mar 8 (3:25 - 4:15pm) Blizzard conditions, heavy, horizontal snow falling...very poor visibility: Nest looked empty until 3:45pm when I saw Lola's head pop up from nest. Next minute, Pale Male materializes and flies to the northeast upper roof of Dr. Fisher's and looks to be eating, and/or preparing food. He flies to Lola on nest and presents food (which could not be identified). He stays only a minute and then flies to Linda #1. Lola appears to be feeding. At 4:10pm Pale Male flies off Linda heading north along 5th Avenue treeline. Lola remains in nest. I leave park at 4:15pm. Believe Lola was in nest during all of my short 45 minutes viewing time.

Katherine H

This bird is an Eastern Phoebe, a member of the flycatcher family.

MARCH 13 is the day it often ARRIVES IN CENTRAL PARK, heralding the real beginning of the SPRING MIGRATION!!!

SOME AMUSING CORRESPONDENCE
[Re: sexual nomenclature
and
Blakeman on Incubation -- see below]


Jack Meyer writes:

Re terms for sexual activity, I don't know if it really applies to the
very brief on-off action of the hawks, but I've always liked the word copulation for it's
up-down-up-down meter.
In-out, in-out?

Jack

Eleanor Macdonald writes:

Dear Marie, If you are a fan of Anthony Trollope you may have seen his reference to passionate contact between humans. I can't remember which book it was in; however, I am certain that he used the phrase "a ruffling of the feathers." Obviously, he had adopted this euphemism from his observation of birds. In Victorian days this was as far as he could go. This bit of trivia probably will be of no help in your postings about Pale Male and Lola since it is quite a mouthful. And if you said the hawks were observed ruffling it would puzzle more people than it would enlighten. As a lover of Trollope I couldn't resist putting in my two cents. My favorite Trollope is "The American Senator", a hilariously funny book with a fabulously drawn mercenary heroine named Arabella Trefoil.


Referring to a quote from John Blakeman, Karen Ann Kolling observes wryly:

"There may be some discomfort involved in creating and passing an egg through her reproductive organs."

Only a man could write that...