Fledge watch 7-30-14
By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK
The morning started out cloudy and dark with a temperature of 59 (F) 15 (C) and rain in spots and turned partly sunny
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As the 6am bell tolled and I arrived on the Broad St. Bridge (BSB) I spotted 2 juvies fly over the South Ave. garage heading north and out of view behind buildings. As I turned to face the Times Square building (TSB) I spotted a falcon on the southeast column, 1 level above fledge ledge. I went down to the hole tom observe but then decided in front of the Blue Cross Arena (BCA) gave a better look.
This juvie was eating at first as I saw another fly over Mercury and head north. the TSB juvie finished eating, cleaned itself up, pooped then flew southeast.
I drove around the city including a stop on the west end of the Pont de Rennes pedestrian bridge where the High Falls were rumbling.
I found no falcons until I returned to the BSB. There, I spotted a juvie flying above Xerox-as I started to tape it another popped into the picture and then the fun started. They chased each other and talon tagged all over the top of Xerox going in and out of view. It was a boy and a girl sky dancing for me.
Even tho the sun was behind them, silhouetting their images, you can still appreciate their beauty and maneuverability in the air. I lost them to the east so I left the BSB and shot them from Chestnut St. in front of the Martin Luther King Jr. Park (formerly known as Manhattan Square Park). The female landed on the east side roof of Xerox near the northeast corner as the male kept flying at her and buzzing by from every direction until they both vanished from my sight.
Next up, I spotted a falcon on the 2nd arm of the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT) from the Andrews St. Bridge (ASB). It had its back to me so I went to Plymouth Ave. to see the front, but the sun was right behind it making it impossible to ID.
This juvie flew north and I followed right behind to find falcons on the 19th and 20th floors of Kodak Office (KO). They were on the southeast corners and at least one of them was a juvie-they were screaming at Dot.Ca (DC) who was on the 20th floor northeast corner. They took off before I could get a shot of them- the juvie , whom I identified as Nettie knocked DC off and chased him behind KO then landed on the 17th floor southeast corner with food.
Beauty was now on the northeast corner of the 17th floor and DC, ended up on the northeast corner of the launchpad. I’m not really sure when, where or by whom, but the food was exchanged and Nettie had it!
At first Nettie was noisily mantling the food but she settled down to start eating. Then DC flew off and got her all riled up again and eventually he landed next to her and started eating a piece of food himself. Meanwhile, Beauty just watched from afar as Nettie mantled her food from dad.
DC flew west and left Nettie to eat her treasure-at times she would stop eating and for no apparent reason start whining, then continue eating. Beauty also whined a few times too-like mother, like daughter I guess.
I left them to look for the other juvies but I had no luck finding anybody else so I called it quits at 9:30am. It was quite an entertaining watch that left a smile on my face! 🙂
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