Mai Stewart's questions for John Blakeman

JB said that PM + Lola's "cavorting" (NY Post's euphemism) "can only be a 'displacement' behavior" and there are "absolutely no known cases of red-tails renesting this late in the season."

However, the question arises, if they're doing what they need to do in order to make babies (no matter why they're doing it), might this not result in new eggs? i.e., is Lola biologically capable of producing eggs at this stage, late in the Spring?

Also, I can't imagine that there wouldn't still be abundant prey available in CP, no matter the time of year -- seems to me that CP is ALWAYS a target-rich environment, full of tender morsels for our raptors -- does this really change in August? I thought the pigeons, squirrels, rats, etc., are ALWAYS there, even in August-? Things may be different out in the country, but NYC never seems to lack the meal-of-choice options of PM + Lola.

Lastly, even JB has been surprised by the unusual adaptation to city life and the resilience of our now-famous hawks -- he, himself, has noted on more than one occasion that their behavior and abilitity not only to survive, but to flourish, in what one would assume to be a highly hawk-hostile environment has defied all normal hawk-behavior expectations -- so, would it really be so strange if they defied even this aspect of "normal" hawk life -- and had a late family??

Would love to hear JB's thoughts on the above questions, if he's willing -- I bet I'm not the only one who's had these thoughts --

Mai Stewart