Photos by Ed Ng.
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- The Hike Chester flyer announcing David Dean’s tutorial and hawk watch at Seward’s Hill. This was the fourth hike sponsored by Chester Recreation.
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- We assembled in Chester Borough’s court room where David Dean (standing) tutored us on the finer points of hawk watching.
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- Dave distributed copies of a very helpful guide to local hawks. See link above to download the free pdf from battaly.com
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- We watched a slide presentation by the Hawk Migration Association of North America (HMANA) tutoring us on how to spot and differentiate between different hawks.
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- There was a lot to learn!
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- This slide was prescient, guess what we spotted from Seward’s Hill?
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- Of course we had a quiz! David presents one of his magnificent hawk photos to one of the successful quiz takers.
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- Leaving the court room we headed into a sunny, cool morning. A group photo of the Deans (center rear) with the hawk watch newbies at a meadow just below Seward’s Hill.
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- It was an easy, short hike from the Court Room to Seward’s Hill.
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- At the top we were rewarded with a spectacular panorama. This view looks north east from Seward’s Hill (are we still in New Jersey? Yes and enjoy it!)
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- Dave Jr. sets up the scope atop Seward’s Hill so we can see 1 World Trade Center.
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- Using the concrete pad and old steel stanchion as 12 o’clock, look out around 10 o’clock to see 1 World Trade Center.
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- And there it is, in silhouette, 1 World Trade Center AKA The Freedom Tower, just over the horizon.
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- Looking closer to home from Seward’s Hill, one sees emerging fall colors.
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- A river of red shimmers across the valley below
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- A turkey vulture checks us out, hopefully finding nothing interesting. In addition to turkey vultures we also spotted several red tailed hawks and a golden eagle.
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- Just 3 of the hundreds of turkey vultures we saw riding the nearby columns of warm air to great heights. For great hawk watching, Dave Dean suggested Scotts Mountain at Merrill Creek Reservoir. See www.merrillcreek.com for more information. See at the next hike!
