bamboo: I have a Scintilla blooming in my sunroom right now. It's ahead of Star and behind Jewel. It took amazingly little chilling for any of them to bloom. Scintilla fruited last year. I thought the fruit was below average, in fact well below average. It's supposed to set a moderate load of high quality, large fruit. It wasn't as good eating as Jewel, Emerald, Star, or Santa Fe. And as compared to Sweetcrisp, pure trash. I have a hard time thinking about adding anything else unless and until Sweetcrisp disappoints. I'll figure out how to fruit Sweetcrisp all year around if it lives up to last year. Most will need differing maturity and I will to at some point. I just like trying new varieties. Here is a link that might be useful: Scintilla description

The bird is not chubby. It's merely fluffing its feathers in cold weather. This is a very characteristic posture in winter. In an instant it can compress its feathers against the body and take on a sleek, aerodynamic form. We, too, are seeing a decline in kestrels in Ohio, totally from a lack of nest sites. Old rural buildings are being lost, and there are no large cavities in trees. The bird is ever more dependent on provided nest boxes. But one up (properly), and kestrels will come.

My husband is a bander and puts up Kestrel boxes in Northern Virginia and Maryland. They prefer open meadows where they hunt voles, crickets, some birds, etc. He puts his up mainly on telephone poles along pastureland. They should be up already for this year, but you may have luck still to attrack a pair. Good luck!

Yeah, the body parts can get to most people : ( Most raptors return to the same area, and many to the same nest site. But: I don't know about kestrels! Here's the thing: Someone will use that cavity, so it's a good idea to close it off after the bebes fledge. I am a bit confused by your last observation. American kestrels that are "immature" look pretty much like mature birds. You'd have to get a close look to see if they are really immature. You know, American kestrel populations have taken a hit recently, and I think it's because of poison (they are big insect eaters, and so suffer from secondary poisoning) and decline of suitable habitat and nest sites. I worked at a wild bird rehab center for over 10 years, and we noticed that many of the kestrel chicks we got were from cities, which was encouraging and rather startling, as these are birds that depend on grasslands for hunting. Here is a link that might be useful: AK info