16 May 2007 - American Kestrel update - Tuttle

E-Mail from and photos by Dick Tuttle:

Hello Everyone,

Dick Phillips and I monitored the 50 mile long roadside kestrel box trail for the third time on Wednesday, May 16. Of 18 nest boxes hanging from poles, 14 contain active falcon nests; four with females sitting on eggs or young, four with eggs, and six nests with nestlings.

Young kestrels huddled in balls to share valuable body heat. They ranged in age from three to ten days.

It is common to find female kestrels brooding their young for the first week or so after hatching. Since our nest boxes are top opening, we can safely inspect the families without bothering parent birds. If needed, mother kestrels will flip on their backs and slash with their fish hook-like talons to protect their young. I have never experienced this behavior since I mind my own business. I can count the young at a later visit when the mother is no longer brooding her young.

Females brood young for a week or more and the male is the sole provider during this period. He delivers field rodents and large insects to his family. Regurgitated pellets (elongated hair balls with bones) are found in most of the boxes. Beetles of several species invade the boxes to further decompose animal remains as they live in the white pine bedding.

Most of our boxes are located along country roads lined with fields farmed for soybeans and corn. Kestrels can only hunt the grassy berms from utility wires. If not for predators, rodents would multiply to invade the many homes that are sprouting up throughout Delaware County. Something to think about. Too bad Alfred Hitchcock is no longer with us. Nonetheless, "The Rodents" just doesn't have a ring to it like "The Birds."

During this last visit, one female positioned her wing to shield her young from the monster (me) looking down from her ceiling -- or was she getting ready to flip and slash? Ah, the wildness of it all!

Raptor on without bleeding, Dick Tuttle