Fledging drama...

The story for today...I checked nests all day and planned to end at a nest where I was told that the first chick has fledged this morning. When I arrived at about 4 pm, the gentleman who is watching that nest told me that the chick had tried to land on the top of the antenna on a cell tower and then slid down into the cell tower itself. The chick was down amongst the cables and well below the top of the tower, with many panels around her. Our first concern was whether her feet were caught in the cables or wires. After looking from every angle we determined she was free and appeared to be uninjured. But she was just perched there looking around, as if she was trapped in a cage. I watched or over two hours...chick did not seem to be making any effort to extricate herself. Dinner was served on the nest to the other chick. That did not seem to motivate this one. Finally at 6 pm I went home for some dinner and tried to figure out what to do. No cell tower employee would come out on a Saturday. I went back at 7pm and the chick had not moved. But her interest in getting back to the nest was increasing. She finally started turning around and trying to stretch her wings...but they hit on the mechanics of the cell tower. She turned around several times, looking up, looking down. She finally hopped a little closer to the edge of the tower. Stood there nervously for quite a while, trying to flap her wings in tight quarters. Then she went back to the center of the tower. Argh! Then Dad flew past with a fish. Now this chick had been stuck here for at least 4.5 hours and she was hungry...so she went back to the edge of the tower and looked down, put her wings out, retreated a bit, then finally, with me whispering "just do it", she took the leap and was out of there and flying loops which eventually led her back to her nest at 8:30. She began hollering loudly for food, and when Dad came quickly she grabbed that fish before the other chick had a chance and began inhaling it. Whew. Suddenly I was exhausted...probably from holding my breath. So there you go...that's what I go thru at fledging time! Thanks to Perry for his observations and concern over this young bird. All is well that ends well. I found several other chicks that had fledged also at other nests and one that could not be located tho I searched for quite a while. I will keep looking to confirm successful fledging.