By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

I spent my whole watch down by the lake (Ontario) (9:30 am to 1:30 pm).  That wasn’t my intention, but that’s how it worked out today.

There was a high wind warning posted for Rochester, NY with sustained winds of 25-35 mph and gusts of 50 mph.  I started my watch by driving along the lake shore, checking out the spots we have seen falcons recently. Latta location, no.  Russell Station, no.  Charlotte/Summerville, no.  There were dark clouds over the lake and the lake was full of white caps.

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After finding no falcons on my lake route, something made me return to Russell Station (RS)  instead of heading downtown and I’m really glad I did.  I was parked in the small parking lot just north of RS when I saw a bird on the antenna at the west end of the building.  At first I thought it was a crow, because it was crouched over.  Not the usual posture of a Peregrine Falcon.  I drove around to the south side where I had a better view.  It was definitely not a Crow.  It was a juvenile Peregrine Falcon.

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The reason this juvie was hunched over was because of the high winds.  She was having trouble hanging on to the antenna she was perched on.  Every now and then she would let go and hover and then let the wind catch her.  When that happened, she would add the speed of the wind to her own and zip around the smoke stacks and then return to the antenna to ride it again.  To me it looked like she was playing.

Just after I sent a text out that there was a falcon at RS, she took off again and let the wind carry her to the west.  I lost sight of her and she did not return to the antenna.  I drove back around to the north side parking lot and watched from there.  Dana and Lou joined me.  I saw about 6 pigeons fly from the building.  That’s when I spotted the juvie on the north side between the two stacks on the ledge below the top row of windows.

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Kathy O joined.  It was windy and rainy now, so we all stayed in our cars.  Finally it cleared up for a little while.  Dana was able to verify that the band was black over green.  We are fairly certain that this was Billy, the juvenile that has been seen here recently.  It had been a few days since she had been seen by anyone, so it was great seeing her.

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She remained in that spot for a long time.  But, she finally took off and again took flight, flying on the high winds.  Dana and I saw her stoop towards the small pond to the north and zip over the water where there was a group of mallards swimming.  She did’t get one and returned to fly around the stacks.

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After awhile, we lost sight of Billy and could not find her.  I was very happy for the time we had with this young falcon. It started to rain again, so I decided to end my watch at 1:30 pm.  I hope we see a lot more of Billy in the future and that she finds a place of her own and a mate.

There was still a lot of beautiful fall leaves before the winds started, but I bet there’s a lot less now.  Goodnight everyone!

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 10th, 2013 at 10:31 PM and is filed under Falcon Watch. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.