Anyone who walks or lives on University Pkwy. probably knows about the pair of hawks – Red-shouldered Hawks, we think – raising three offspring in a huge nest up in a sycamore tree in the wide, verdant median.

Tonight, a Hampden couple found one of the young on the road below the nest, flapping around in distress and barely staying out of the way of traffic.

“It was flapping and running like a chicken and it kind of did a U-turn to get away from the cars,” said Matt Masaschi. “Then it stopped and just hunched down and looked sort of like a turtle.”

Masaschi and his wife Andrea had been on an early-evening walk when Andrea spotted the bird. Masaschi said the young hawk, surprisingly, let him pick it up.

Then they waited, for what seemed like a long time, for someone to come along with a phone so they could call Masaschi’s brother, a naturalist, and figure out what to do.

Finally, they got the phone and the advice: to take the animal  to a Baltimore County wildlife rescuer. At some point, a passerby with a stroller gave them a fleece baby blanket to swaddle the animal. Andrea ran off to get their car, while Matt stayed behind holding the bird very, very still. It didn’t fight him.

“I’m not sure if the bird is shaking, or it’s just me shaking, holding him,” he said. The back of its neck looked a little raggedy, as if some of the feathers had been pecked away or come off somehow.

Several walkers and runners came along and at one point there were a half dozen people watching the show, many of whom said they had been watching the hawk family for months.

One woman said she was sure they are Sharp-Shinned Hawks, but they seemed to me more like Red-shouldered Hawks.

We’re looking forward to finding out more from the rescue people or knowledgeable birders. We’re wondering also how this could have happened. Do parents and siblings, as we’ve read, really boot one of the family out of the nest when things get too crowded in there?

The hawk parents  – big, beautiful birds with black-and-white barred wings and reddish brown chests – have been spotted all over the neighborhood this spring, bringing sticks for the nest and, later, assorted rodents and small birds to feed the noisy young.

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10 p.m. Update:

We got the following email from Matt Masaschi:

Good evening everyone! What an exciting walk my wife Andrea and I had tonight. We never thought it would lead to rescuing a bird that could have possibly died if we (everyone!) had not stepped in to help.

Andrea and I safely delivered the Hawk to the Phoenix Wildlife Center, Inc. in Phoenix, MD this evening. They were very happy that we brought the bird to them. They ID’d it as a Red Shoulder Hawk. They were astonished at how malnourished the bird was. They showed us its breast bone, which we should not have been able to have seen. Under healthy circumstances, the muscle would have been built up around the chest. They will be tube feeding it either Ensure or Boost until it is strong enough to eat its regular food. They said if they tried to feed the hawk its “regular” food it would die from the shock to its system.

The center is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit corporation and is run by Kathleen Woods, a Master Wildlife Rehabilitator, and her husband Hugh. They take in 1000’s of birds a year and nurse them back to health.

They feared it may have been pushed out of the nest, as suspected. They asked if you could please monitor the area/nest to be sure the other two birds don’t end up stranded on the ground. They fear if something were to happen to the parent birds, the two young birds could end up in a similar position that we found this one. If you see the other birds struggling on the ground please contact Kathy at the following:

phoenixcenter@comcast.net or 410-628-9736

We thank everyone for helping Andrea and I get the bird safely to the center. If you could please send any pictures back it would be much appreciated!

See you around the neighborhood!