Larry, Lucy and Lucky

Last night was a reminder of why it’s good to break old habits. I’m in the habit of running errands on the weekends. But with the days getting longer and the weather getting warmer, last night when I got home I decided to go back out and break the pattern. I headed to Fresh Pond shopping center in Cambridge. I made it through the rush hour traffic, about to turn into the parking lot when I noticed a guy with a humongous camera lens/telescope. I look to the sky and see nothing. It’s sunny, full cloud cover – no astrological citing. Bummer. I really couldn’t figure out what it was. But he was sure drawing a bunch of attention from all the cars driving by, slowing down. Thought nothing of it until a half hour later, I was pulling into the parking lot across the street for errand #2 and see yet another man with a similar set up. I park and decide to go ask.

Turns out there is a nest of red-tail hawks on the top of the façade of the office building. Buzz and Ruby have three little chicks they’re feeding and raising. The fellow I talked with was very friendly and there was something refreshing about his unabashed enthusiasm of following the birds. They’re at 42 days right now and red-tail hawks are known to take their first flight between 40 and 45 days. So any day now. A friend of his had been there since 5 am that morning. And just as I was about to head off, a little boy runs up with his binoculars to say ‘hi’, his grandfather in tow. He was so excited.

The gentleman I was talking with told me to check out Ernie Sarro’s youtube video. From there I found his blog posting on the family, and pulled most of these pictures (only the blurry, random picture is mine, as I was walking away). He even showed me some of the pictures he had taken. One was amazing, showing one of the chicks (who are no longer fluffy, but fully feathered) on the edge of the next, wings fully extended, testing the “waters”. Apparently the births of the three chicks are staggered. This way the parents are assured at least the first one makes it. They always feed the eldest first. Except now, he noticed one time, Ruby flew up with a rat and gave it to the youngest first, pushing aside the other two older siblings. Very unusal. But a good sign since apparently if food is scarce, siblingcide can occur for food. I just realized this means they won’t all be taking their first flight at the same time.

The funny thing is I think I had seen Buzz before. Or maybe it was Ruby. About two weeks ago, I was trapped in the Alewife traffic tangle one morning. I was just looking out the window and see a bird fly by, up above. All I could tell was that it was a predator bird. It lands on top of one of the tall light poles, right in the center of the mess of cars. And just sits there and watches the fools stuck in their terrain vehicles, in their traffic jam. A moment later a little sparrow flies up and flits about for a little and finally settles on a lower perch. And that was the moment. Peace thirty feet up, above the chaotic mess of rush hour.