This post was prompted by a discussion about a loose feather first noticed on Stitch, the female red-tailed hawk at Eaglecrest. One of Stitch's beautiful red tail feathers was flying with the wind, as she incubated the first egg of her clutch on March 21.

After quite a bit of research, I came upon an internet site that has an excellent article called "Bird Feather Types, Anatomy, Growth, Color, and Molting." It's written in layman's language, and appears accurate except for the mispelling of "rectrices," the term for tail feathers.

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=15+1829&aid=2776

How does this relate to our discusson about Stitch's loose feather? Here are a few facts to consider:

(1) Red-tails molt once a year, usually following breeding season and lasting into fall.

(2) Newly formed feathers (blood feathers) push existing feathers out of the follicle during molt; when the feather is mature, the blood dries, leaving the rachis hollow.

(3) If a mature feather breaks, it will remain broken until the natural time for its molt.

(4) Loss of a single feather is not likely to impede a bird's ability to fly; loss of many flight feathers is more serious and can certainly hamper the bird's ability to fly.

Other references:

Manual of Ornithology: Avian Structure and Function by Noble S. Proctor and Patrick J. Lynch

The Sibley Guide to Bird Life & Behavior: National Audubon Society

A Guide to Bird Behavior by Donald & Lillian Stokes

http://www.kitchubb.ca/columns/031215.pdf

Stitch behaves like an old pro when it comes to egg-laying and care. Wonder how old she is?

Snake snack is an awesome catch! Thanks for the video Peg and for catching the egg laying, too.

Pip?

First pip probably occurred during the night and was first observed as a fairly large hole around 7:00 a.m. nest time. Hatching progressed rapidly, and a new eyas emerged at around 9:00 a.m. Wet and pink, the hatchling quickly dried to a white fluffy fuzzball. By early afternoon, the eyas was holding him/herself up quite nicely, with alert eyes and open mouth.

A few of us have waited a very long time to see this day arrive. We began August 22, 2011 with great expectation and anxiously awaited the occasional glimpse of Big Mama and Papa as they occasionally met on their love branch or landed in their nest, dreaming about watching little RT's or speculating on the possibility that we'd be watching little GHO's instead. A lot of time has passed and a lot of things have changed, but I am happy that Eaglecrest finally got their little RT and that we were there to watch it together.

The total number of days between Monday, August 22nd, 2011 and Thursday, April 25th, 2013 is 612 days.

This is equal to exactly 1 year, 8 months, and 3 days.

This does not include the end date, so it's accurate if you're measuring your age in days, or the total days between the start and end date. But if you want the duration of an event that includes both the starting date and the ending date, then it would actually be 613 days.

612 days is equal to 87 weeks and 3 days.

The total time span from 2011-08-22 to 2013-04-25 is 14,688 hours.

This is equivalent to 881,280 minutes.

You can also convert 612 days to 52,876,800 seconds.

Today is 4/25/2013 and 8/22/2011 is exactly 612 days before today.

We've come a long way, baby!


Thanks to Priscillash for the video.

Quote: ncaerie wrote in post #36

---

Here is the new hatchling's first feeding video!

'Sleepy Hatchlings' 1:05 pm _4.25.13_ http://youtu.be/JGJsYY2Kv1Y

---

Today, Stitch finally lost the broken tail feather that has plagued her for weeks. (Actually, it may only have bothered us.) The first photo is a closeup of the broken feather while still attached, showing it split at the shaft and still hanging on. The second photo shows Stitch brooding her first hatchling; the offending feather lies to the bottom left in the nest.

I have never seen a hawk or eagle parent preen, cuddle, and nuzzle a hatchling quite like Stitch does. She is a loving mama.

Video by priscillash
http://youtu.be/yL_JtFtUQU4