By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

Reported Falcon Sightings:

7:44 am – Shaky reports through RFalconcam Now:  “DT. Beauty is on Mercury’s money bag.” – From Camera #1 at the Nest Box

12:50 pm – Tweet from Lisa McK:  “BS. So far found 1falcon at BS, on south side.” – This was Lisa’s only tweet, so 2nd falcon not found at BS.

2:00 pm – Tweet from Larry O:  “BS. Brighton Falcon watch drive by. 1 Falcon on West extension.” – Again, only one falcon seen at BS.

4:20 pm – Tweet from Carol P:  “DT. Found a falcon I assume is Beauty on top of the Hyatt on the west, river side. Have not seen her up there in awhile. Starting to snow.”

4:40 pm – Tweet from Carol P:  “DT. Well who knows where she is now. Checked all over & can’t find her. Heading home to warm up. Tomorrow will be a MUCH nicer day!”

My evening Falcon Watch report from downtown (3:45 – 4:45 pm)

After a quick check of KP with no luck finding any falcons, I arrived downtown at approximately 4:00 pm.  After checking all over the downtown area, I finally spotted a tail sticking out on a building I had not seen a falcon on in quite awhile from the north side of the Rochester Library.  That tail looked really familiar.  I had to get further away from the building to check it out, so I parked on the Broad St Bridge back by the War Memorial, facing east.  Through my binoculars, I verified that the tail was connected to a Peregrine Falcon sitting up on top of the Hyatt Hotel on the west side.  I assumed it was Beauty, but she had her back to me and it was starting to snow, so I never got a really good look.  I never like to say what falcon I’ve seen, unless I get a good look and I’m certain, or fairly certain, which bird I’m watching.

People that are not used to looking for the falcons have a hard time seeing them.  It’s really hard until you’ve had a lot of practice.  You have to train your eye to find them.  I’ll never forget my first lesson when I walked with Jim P around the Kodak Office buildings.  He’d point out falcons in different locations and I remember having the hardest time finding them.  Jim told me that once you’ve studied a building you get to know what should be there and then it’s easier to find what shouldn’t be there.  Today was such an example.

Beauty has been pretty consistently on certain spots, ie. the Mercury Statue, the OCSR IBeams, the Frontier Communication Tower, the Jail Communication Tower and now the OCSR elevator shaft.  Today she was on the Hyatt, a building I have not seen her on in a long time.  I’m not saying she never goes there, she can certainly land on any building she wants!  lol

So , while sitting in traffic at the light near the library, I looked up to my left and saw a “blip” aka tail, poking out from a smooth ledge under the Hyatt sign.  Using my binoculars, I verified it was in fact a dark gray tail.  I quickly drove back to the Broad St Bridge and parked farther out facing east to get a better view of what was up on that ledge.  I could see that it was a falcon shaped and sized bird, and with binoculars I verified it was in fact a Peregrine Falcon.  The whole time I watched, the falcon never turned around so that I could see the front to better see if it was Beauty.  I assume it was, but I can’t be sure.  I will say that it was Beauty.

At about 4:30 pm, it started to snow harder and I was already losing light.  That’s when Beauty decided to leave the Hyatt.  I lost sight of her and was not able to find her after checking out the whole downtown area, even a good look up into the OCSR elevator shaft.

Since it was cloudy, snowy and getting dark, I decided to end my Watch.  Tomorrow promises to be a nice day with warmer temps and sunshine and it’s Saturday!  Woohoo!

Are you ready for a quick lesson on how to spot a falcon?  I am going to leave you with a few pics I took of Beauty up on the Hyatt from the west end of the Broad St Bridge near the Blue Cross Arena aka the War Memorial, with arrows pointing out her location.  This way you can practice spotting a falcon on a building.  🙂

REMEMBER TO CLICK ON A PICTURE FOR A LARGER VIEW.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 30th, 2012 at 11:53 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.