Red-shouldered hawk with chicks

A day after the adult was photographed landing on a fence rail nearby, this frame caught what was likely the same pair’s nest — two downy white chicks barely able to hold their heads up, with an adult standing watch just above them in the sycamore’s peeling bark.

Why it matters

Red-shouldered hawk chicks hatch covered in white down and are almost entirely dependent on their parents for close to six weeks before fledging, during which time an adult rarely strays far from the nest — exactly the kind of watchfulness on display here.

Getting the shot

Shot from well back with the long lens rather than approaching the nest tree, since disturbing a raptor with chicks this young risks the adult abandoning the nest. The gap in the branches happened to line up on its own.