Morning watch 6-4-13
By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK
Todays starting temperature was 49 (F) 9 (C), chilly enough for me to put gloves on but the sun shone bright and the skies were blue!
I arrived downtown at 5:20am and drove straight to the hole (Aqueduct St.) and couldn’t see any sign of Dot.Ca (DC) but the sliver of a moon looked nice behind Mercury.
I gave it a while and then drove up to the Broad St. Bridge (BSB) to join Dan-he hadn’t seen any action either. While business was slow I took a walk down under the BSB and checked out the graffiti on the walls in the old aqueduct.
Always click my pics for the full version
At 6:03am we spotted DC fly to the main cam and land on top, his newest guarding spot. Beauty came flying out of the box and flew east over the river to the southwest corner of the Radisson Hotel. She grabbed cached food and took it back to the nest box with her. Annette,Ei and Campgee all let me know Beauty was feeding the eyases. Thanks girls!
At 6:24am I tweeted that DC flew to the heel of Mercury, but Donna let me know it was actually Beauty. Thanks for the heads up! 5 minutes later she was off to the deck.
Beauty would go in the nest box 5 minutes later and DC flew over to the base of Mercury and started eating something.
DC made short work of whatever he had up there taking no more than 5 minutes to finish eating. He then flew east crossing the river and disappearing behind the Hyatt Hotel momentarily and circle back over the river to the top ibeam south corner of OCSR.
Dan left around 7am and I drove down to Graves St. by Aqueduct Park to get closer to DC. He did some preening and lots of stretching while we shared space.
At 7:40 DC flew toward the Times Square building as I quickly lost sight of him behind buildings.
I couldn’t find him so I left for the Brighton site arriving there just before 8am. While I was parked in the rear of the building Larry pulled up next to me on his way to work momentarily. I had to tell him that Pigott was not home today-I haven’t seen her in days during the morning hours but other watchers have seen her on the evening shift.I’m really looking forward to our next visit!
I returned downtown when I received a tweet from Annette saying both Beauty and DC were feeding their babies. Thanks again! I was back on the BSB at 8:30am I spotted both parents out flying above the Thomson Reuters and Philipone buildings. The Beautyful one ended up on the deck and then went in the nest box. DC flew to the south corner top ibeam of OCSR and that’s where I left him ending my watch at 8:45am.
It’s been slim pickin’s getting to see Beauty outside of the nest box for very long lately, but whenever I do it makes me smile! 🙂
Click on the links below to view a couple videos I shot on my watch and more pics as well
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0AaN3DFm0ZMWqiGC
June 4th, 2013 at 9:44 PM
Most of the graffiti is junk, but there is one impressive portrait.
Dot.ca on the camera – hope he does not knock it out of alignment – that did happen one year back at the Kodak Tower. A falcon pushed off and suddenly we were looking into space.
June 4th, 2013 at 10:58 PM
DC is really into perching on the cams the last few days Alison. Beauty has always perched on the main cam-that one’s pretty solid,I don’t think they could knock it out of alignment.
June 5th, 2013 at 12:30 AM
DC looks great in the video and the pics and so does Beauty!
Love the BYF captions….I’m surprised you can’t hear me roaring with laughter all the way from NJ lol 🙂
I love the river video…the power of the river is amazing!
And the Mercury with the moon photo is fabulous! My kind of photo! Love the moon!
Thank you! 🙂
June 5th, 2013 at 9:24 AM
I love the moon picture too! There sure is a lot of graffiti on the walls of the aqueduct and I agree with Alison-most is junk but that one picture is really good! Wish these people would put their artistry to better use though and not tag. I also loved the river video!
June 5th, 2013 at 11:01 AM
Thanks for your comments Ginny and Kris! I could sit by moving water all day-I find it calming and gives me the opportunity to reflect and sort things out in my head. I too, love moon as well as sun shots. They look so close and yet are so far away! 🙂