Donna's Thursday Report

Pale Male & Lola on nest, April 14, 2006
Photo by Lincoln Karim

The Hawk Bench, Thursday, 13 Apr 2006

At 3:05 PM Pale Male sits on Carlyle 2, and by 3:13 Lola stands on the edge of the nest bowl. She stretches, she preens her wings, she works each individual tail feather. Hawk and human alike bide time, find tiny pastimes. The group waits.

Voices are heard again, "What day did she first spend the night on the nest?"

3:17, Lola's head goes down in the bowl, all the human heads go up. Lola's head wiggles out of sight. She settles carefully back into the nest with the familiar shuffle of feet. The humans held breathe is released.

"So how many days has it taken in years past?"

The day continues as have many other days, Pale Male watches from the Carlyle, he dives, disappears behind Stovepipe. lola stands again at 3:40, turns, preens, then her head disappears momentarily into the concave, she settles, faces south now.

3:42, and Pale Male sits the railing of Stovepipe, then disappears behind it and the Oreo. Lola's head is up. She watches him, alert to the north.

3:55 Pale Male lands the far NW corner of the third level down of Stovepipe.

4:00 Lola is off the nest and over to the 4th level of Stovepipe. Pale Male takes off in a straight shot and lands nest left, looks at us, looks at the eggs, adjusts twigs.

4:02 Lola disappears behind Stovepipe.

4:10 A Red-tail (Lola?) flies from the south field of view to the far north and disappears behind The Oreo.

4:17 Lola lands on the nest and preens her tummy.

4:18 Pale Male off the nest, N over Fifth's buildings, past Stovepipe. Lola preens, shuffles down, her beak prods something beneath her. She disappears into the nest.

The familiar activities proceed. Pale Male appears and disappears. Lola stands, preens, turns, settles back in periodically. Turkey Vultures pass over at 5:43.

5:48 Suddenly voices are raised, "look! There he is." And indeed it is. Pale Male is sitting, prey in talons, on a branch of the tree just behind the north bench of the Anderson statue.

"What does he have?"

"It's fuzzy."

"Some kind of mammal."

Eleanor Tauber gets a photo, zooms it in. YES! It's a squirrel. Pale Male is up in a soaring display from one end of the Model Boat Pond to the other. He circles and zooms past the nest showing Lola his catch. Perhaps after yesterday's rejected pigeon, he now has a meal she'll like. The flight looks downright celebratory. In time he goes in and she goes out for dinner.

Storm clouds gather in the north.

6:14 Lola sits on the Oreo antenna, whets her beak. Pale Male shifts position in the nest.

6:30 Lola is up and circling Oreo. She passes Fisher, lands nest right, waits, preens. Eventually Pale Male stands, then flies north.

6:40 Pale Male circles above The Oreo and Shipshape, where the left end of a rainbow has appeared.

"Isn't a rainbow the symbol of kept promises?"

6:50 Exit.