Peregrine Courting, Post Valentine

There is nothing quite as refreshing as a sunny winter day filled with ee-chupping falcons. When I went out today at lunchtime I didn't see any Peregrines, but that soft sound carried over the din of State Street seven stories below me. It took a bit of looking but I finally found Mariah perched on the east side of the Kodak tower's cupola:

Hardly had I a chance to appreciate my first good look at her this year when she decided she'd rather be flying than sitting:
          

I was delighted to see that Mariah was in picture-perfect form. At an estimated fourteen years, she's definitely pushing the envelope for Peregrine life expectancy, but seeing her powerful sure wingbeats you'd be forgiven for thinking you were watching a bird in the flower of youth.

I was even more thrilled to watch through my binoculars as she sailed downtown and met up with a male! Was this Kaver, recently returned from his winter sojourn? It's a little early for that. Usually we don't see Kaver until the first week of March. But Mariah seemed pretty comfortable gamboling through the air with the tiercel, and without getting a closer look it's hard to draw a definitive conclusion.

They were pretty far away for a picture, but I decided to try for a shot of the two of them together. Unfortunately, brief as the transition from binoculars to camera was, the falcons made themselves scarce. I returned to scanning the sky without luck. Then, true to form, there was Mariah back on the tower, as if she'd never left:
     

She chupped a little more, and I considered the possibility of a mating attempt, but before too long she flew back downtown again. This time she passed more directly overhead, allowing a better opportunity for photos:
          

I was a little rusty for my first time out this year and I'm experimenting with my camera settings so the shots didn't come out as sharp as I'd have liked. Nevertheless I kept her in my viewfinder this time, following her all the way out to the Four Seasons building where she circled, then flew up into the opening at the top of the external elevator shaft:


After another period of searching I found the two falcons flying south over the river and near many of the downtown high-rise office buildings:


The pair didn't get too close, so I'm not certain that the male is Kaver. Her courtship vocalizations were unmistakable though, so we'll need to keep an eye out for a closer look at the male. Maybe this is Kaver on an early return, or maybe it's a newcomer looking to impress Mariah in her territory. Time, and sharp eyes, will give us an answer.

Before I went in for the afternoon I noticed that the new apartment building that occupies the former site of the Kodak Visitor parking lot is largely finished, and looking for commercial tenants to occupy the first floor:


If the building's managers haven't started taking applications for residential tenants they soon will. Having people living right across the road from the Kodak Office complex should make for an interesting season of falcon watching.

Raptor Romance a Welcome Sight

OK ...so it's not really romance-- Falcons of course, are much too busy to bother with affairs of the heart. Author's license aside though, every spring for the past few years one of my "must have" photo sequences has been to capture Mariah and Kaver in the act of mating. Not out of any prurient interest, but rather because because it's an affirmation of the promise of spring, a welcome harbinger of the season to come. Call me crazy, but I also find the dynamics of the act fascinating.

So yesterday I found myself outside at lunch time for what promised to be the best weather of the week. The forecast in Rochester is for snow, rain and clouds for the next few days, but today featured crisp a crisp azure sky and an abundance of bright sunlight.

Kaver sat near the nest box, resplendent in the sun. Mariah was nowhere to be found. During the first half of the hour that's how things stayed, and I began to think the only activity I was going to witness for the hour was the incremental progress on the construction of the new townhouses across from the Kodak tower.

My waiting was to be rewarded though as Mariah flew in from a her hidden perch somewhere on the east or north side of the cupola at the top of the tower:
     

When she landed tail up on the southwest corner of the playpen, I figured things were about to get more interesting:
     

Kaver didn't make me wait long. He swung out over the construction workers, oblivious to the activity above them, and headed for his rendezvous:


It was a pattern well known to those who've watched these two for a while, so I had no problem getting my camera ready for the landing and subsequent copulation:
          

My Canon chattered away at 6.5 frames per second and the bright conditions helped me grab a great many shots, a mere smattering of which I've included here. One thing I noticed is that for all the care that Kaver appears to take, there's a good deal of jostling going on up there:
          
Look closely and you'll see that Mariah has to work hard to hang on to the edge of the playpen. In a couple of frames I didn't include, she actually lost her footing!

In only a few seconds their brief congress ended:
          

Kaver headed for the High Falls smokestack where he made an effortless landing:
          

Mariah remained where she was for a while, then shook out her feathers and took off:


They both circled over the old Visitor parking lot, then Kaver headed for the communication tower:


I didn't follow Mariah's flight, but I imagine she went downtown because some time later she reappeared, flying in from the south. She landed on the perch rail of the nest box:


Kaver remained on one of the antennas, a sleek silhouette against the blue sky, and that's where I left them as the hour drew to a close.

Back in the office, I checked the images from the Rochester Falconcam's cameras. I'd hoped that the view from Camera 1 would capture Mariah on the corner of the playpen, and indeed there she was in the lower left corner:


Was fortune smiling on us? Did the camera perhaps capture the mating moment? Alas, no. All the action occurred in the minute between the image above and this one:


No big deal-- that's what fast firing D-SLR cameras and long lenses are for. In a bit of a post-script, as I was walking out to my car in the afternoon I witnessed another mating. Watchers are reporting multiple copulations each day. Egg laying should begin in about a week, so everything is on track for another great falcon-rearing season. Of course, the past couple of years have brought mystery and some real drama during egg laying. I wouldn't even hazard a guess as to what we'll see this year, but I'm looking forward to following all the action.

Feeding Fledglings & an Ungraceful Landing

I showed up early Thursday morning to see if I could catch any flying before I went to work. Unfortunately, though I arrived around 7:30AM, I missed all the action, which was nicely reported in Larry O'Heron's Fledge Watch report published at Imprints. A consolation prize of sorts was Sacajawea, perched on the stair tower behind the High Falls office building, which sits across Mill Street from the Kodak visitor parking lot:


I went out onto the Pont de Rennes bridge where I found fellow watchers "Mr. Bird Nerd" Mike, and Paul Reinhart. I got a reverse angle shot of Sacajawea...


And also found a second fledgling on the lip of the middle RGE smokestack:


We waited for some action, but none was forthcoming so I left around 8:30 to begin my work day.

New watcher Kathy Alianell reported on Mariah's very impressive stoop on a pigeon over State Street. As it happened, I was walking up the sidewalk on Morrie Silver Way just as Mariah was executing her hunt. I caught her carrying the prey up to the southeast corner of Building 9:


She dropped off the food and two of the fledglings converged for brunch. Ananta missed the meal, and she chased her mother a while before settling on the 17^th floor of the Kodak tower:
          

The fourth fledgling, who may have been Grace, was sitting on a window sill nearby:


Both of the girls were loudly protesting their lack of food while the luckier pair made quick work of denuding the pigeon:


I went up to the roof of Building 9, hoping to get a clear picture of the feeding falcons by cracking the door and sticking my camera lens out, but when I got there the fledglings had left, taking their food with them. The couldn't have gone far, though, because Mariah had assumed sentry duty:


I took a different exit onto the west side of the roof so that Mariah was hidden from my view (and I from hers). One of the fledglings was in the air, and Mariah must have decided to fly too, because I caught her circling near the tower:


Two fledglings began chasing each other, flying low over the building so that they were often out of my view. I caught up with Grace as she flew toward the tower, headed for a landing on another window sill, or so it seemed. You can imagine my surprise when she misjudged it rather badly:
     

Her gaffe was short-lived, and she recovered neatly enough:
     

In the afternoon I took a walk toward the bridge again. Almost as soon as my foot hit the sidewalk I heard loud kacking above me. It was Grace, with a bit of food grasped securely in her talons:
     

Perhaps it had been brought by Kaver, because he was flying over the visitor parking lot too:


Grace landed on the middle smokestack's catwalk where she tore into her afternoon meal:


I headed home then, escaping the heavy humid air. Friday promises more pleasant weather by far, so I plan on getting an early start.