The 2nd chick had watched its sibling fledge a couple of days before.

The now emptier nest seemed to spur it to more vigorous wing-wapping and branching.

I watched as it hopped up to the same branch that its smaller sibling had used as a launch point for its first flight.

Suddenly the chick was in the air and I fought to catch up with it way down east of the nest.

Apparently it wasn’t as brave as the other fledgling … it quickly turned around.

With an escort of eastern kingbirds (not happy to find another eagle loose in the air) it returned to the nest.

The fledgling’s landing carried it across the nest.  It jumped to the left perch limb, took a breath and left again.

Took me a  while to find it way, way down the cove.