Edge of older woods where treeline meets meadow and cropland
The male, the smaller of the pair, was perched on a branch and had his wings app 1/3 to 1/2 opened and his tail fully fanned. He was just sitting there, slowly folding & unfolding his wings, as if he were trying to dry his feathers or sun himself (except it was an almost totally overcast day with almost no sun), and occassionally using his beak to groom his feathers.
While the male was grooming, the female perched and guarded the area from 1 tree away, not grooming herself or hunting, just observing.
The trees these hawks were perched in today are just 2 trees away from the tall Maple tree they have nested succesfully in the previous 2 years. That nest still remains intact and soon I will start observing it for additions of fresh evergreen pieces which may indicate they will use the same nest again this year.
As of March 5, these hawks have been re-furbishing the same nest they used last year at the edge of my old woods.
Using a spotting scope at 60x from 900 feet away I confirmed there are several pieces of fresh evergreens stuck in the nest sides. This makes the 3rd year in a row these year-round resident Red-tailed hawks have used that same nest.
By March 19, the female was sitting on the nest, hunkered down low, an indication she had finished laying her eggs and was now incubating them.
By April 29, the female was tearing apart meat meals, brough to the nest by her mate, and feeding her nestling(s) by standing at the edge of the nest and bending down low to drop pieces of meat into their mouths.
I have not yet been able to scope the nestlings as they are still too small and/or weak to look up over the top of the nest.
In 4-5 weeks, she will just drop the meat into the bottom of the nest for the nestlings to eat.
GO HERE for timetable chart of Red-tailed Hawk nesting