By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Be sure to click on my pics to view the full version

It was a very humid, warm morning with a temperature of 75 (F) 24 (C) at 6am and overcast dark conditions

As I arrived on the Broad St. bridge Dan was there in his chair, Beauty was under the northeast wing, 2 kids were on the deck and 2 were on the well wall. Dan told me that Dot.Ca (DC) was on the jail tower prior to my arrival and had flown off and not returned. A couple minutes later, Beauty flew to the heel of Mercury, DC came in and took her place under the northeast wing and all the kids were now on the deck as it started to rain. We could see lightening in the western sky as well.

A few minutes after that Beauty flew off to the east side across the river, behind Xerox and returned coming to rest on the base of Mercury.

Next, Beauty stooped on 5 or 6 pigeons over the river-they split up going in different directions, she missed and flew up under the southeast wing of the Times Square building (TSB). DC flew to the Mercury money bag (MMB). Beauty was off again after a moment flying east once more behind Chase and Bausch & Lomb then hovered high above Xerox just riding the winds scoping out the area.The Beautyful one went into a stoop to the south out of sight. As I turned around to face TSB I saw DC on the north corner above the nest box just before he took off and showed up next on the top arm south side of the jail tower.

DC quickly flew off into a stoop to the northwest out of sight. While we were watching for him to resurface, a food drop occurred at the nest box which we missed-reported by both Donna and Annette. Thank you ladies!  DC was now on the MMB and all four eyasses were in our sights.

<Click it

Just before 7am Annette announced Beauty was on deck feeding the family-thanks! Dan left and I went down to the hole for closer viewing and where I can see the north end of the wall, as is my usual routine. It was raining a bit harder at this time.

One of the boys went to the north end of the well wall flapping his wings-he turned and walked a few feet, then turned and went the other way, repeating it several times before going to the parapet to yell something at Beauty prompting her fly off and land up on cam 1. They are so fun to watch!! Annette reported that an eyas was on the nest box roof (probably Nor’Easter as he likes it up there). From my position by Aqueduct and Basin St. I couldn’t see him, so thanks for the heads up Annette! .

DC flew off Mercury around 7:40am and came back around 8am with food-landing on the deck to feed one of the kids. When he was done he went to the top ibeam west corner of OCSR while Mercury did some wingercising on the wall.

DC flew over to Times Square 10 minutes later and landed on the southeast wing ring and Beauty remained on cam 1. The kids had all settled down up on the deck and nest box and things remained this way for an hour at which time DC flew north to the OCSR top ibeam west corner.

<Click it 

A couple minutes later an eyas went to the parapet and another came to the front of the deck-then another surfaced replacing the one on the parapet as he set out to go north on the wall as Beauty watched.

<Click em>

Around 10:45am there were 2 eyasses sleeping on the parapet

It was quiet time again until Beauty flew down to the nest box as reported by NCAfalcons-I missed Beauty fly down to it. Thanks!! The sun came out and the kids got active as one went to the parapet flapping its wings and one to the north end of the wall. A minute later they went to the deck.

An hour later one of the boys went to the very end of the wall and leaned up tight against it as he took in the sights and started getting sleepy. Pat came by on her lunch break for a few minutes and Beauty flew up under the northeast wing.

KrisG reported around 1:15pm that there was an eyas in the box, one on deck, one on right side of the nest box and one on  the north wall. Thanks! Lisa came by on her lunch break around 1:30pm and at 1:38am Carol tweeted that Beauty was on cam 4-I could just barely see her head poking up.

Everybody was quiet again as Joyce relieved me just before 2pm. I drove off smiling after an 8 hour fledge watch with our beloved downtown Rochester Peregrine Falcon family! 🙂

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By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

Fledge Watch from 3:50 to 8:00 pm.

Today was the official start of the Rochester Falcon Fledge Watch.  The two boys, Mercury and Nor’easter are raring to go.  The females, who are bigger and heavier will need more time.  All have lots of white fluff left under their beautiful, brown juvie feathers though, so it may be another day or two.  But one this is for sure, you can never know for sure when they will take their first flights.  We have had our share of  “accidental” flights, so as I always say, expect the unexpected!

It was a very warm day, with a nice breeze.  Temperatures reached the mid 80’s (F).  When I arrived down on Aqueduct St (aka “the hole”) at 3:50 pm, both girls, Tesh and Nettie, were on the nest box platform and both boys, Nor’easter and Mercury, were at the north end of the well wall.  Beauty was up on the northeast wing ledge on top of the Times Square Bldg and Dot.ca was over on the OCSR, 2nd Ibeam down, west end.  There was lots of wing exercising going on up above.  I could see bits of white fluff falling off of the 4 eyases and drifting away on the breeze.

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My first job was to look for somewhere to set-up my chair where I had a good view of the nest box and surrounding area.  I found the perfect spot, in the shade with a nice breeze.  It looked like darker clouds were approaching, but I was assured by our “official falcon weather watcher” Susan C, that there was no rain moving in.  Thanks Susan!  🙂

Soon after I started my watch, Beauty took off and soon returned with food, which she took to the nest box platform.  While she was feeding Tesh and Nettie, Nor’easter and Mercury edged their way closer and closer, finally getting their share.

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After she finished feeding the eyases, Beauty took off with the food and landed on Mercury, then headed back to the nest box, fed some more and returned to the heal of the Mercury statue.  Was she giving them lessons on how to take off while clutching food in her talons?

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Beauty remained on Mercury for quite awhile and Dot.ca flew up to the southeast wing ledge on the Times Square Bldg.  The eyases all returned to the nest box and platform.  In the heat of the afternoon, it seemed that it was siesta time.  All was quiet and there wasn’t much movement by any of the falcons.

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While it was still quiet, Beauty took off and flew around a bit before landing on Camera #1 (aka Pan Cam).  Even after she landed there, the eyases remained quiet.  At least for a little while.

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Finally, I started to see the eyases and their wing exercises continued.  Both Mercury and Nor’easter ran out onto the well wall.  Kathy O joined me on the watch at about 6:30 pm.

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Dot.ca moved to the top IBeam of the OCSR, south corner.  While he was up there, we heard the chittering sound of an irate Kestrel.  We used to hear them all the time when we watched Mariah, Kaver and their young at the Kodak Tower.  This Kestrel was not happy that Dot.ca was nearby.  It dove on Dot.ca a couple times, hovered above and then took off heading northwest.  Dot.ca just sat there, mostly ignoring the Kestrel.  I was happy to see the Kestrel get away safely.  I really like these spunky little falcons!

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During my 4 hour watch both Beauty and Dot.ca did a lot of flying around the Times Square Bldg and the surrounding area.  They were definitely giving flight lessons to their young and the eyases were paying close attention.

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When Kathy and I were getting ready to leave, Larry O tweeted that he was up on the Broad St Bridge.  He had arrived in time to see Dot.ca fly up to the top of the Mercury statue.  When we left at 8:00 pm, the eyases were still moving around, flapping their wings and strengthening the muscles they would need for those first flights.  Goodnight everyone and please consider helping out with the fledge watch if you have a little bit of free time.

By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

A great morning for a fledge watch with sunshine, blue skies and a starting temperature of 57 (F) 14 (C)

Make sure to click on my pics to see the full version

As I arrived on the Broad St. Bridge (BSB)for my first fledge watch Dan was in his spot-he reported that there had been many stoops by Beauty and Dot.Ca (DC) with no catches before I arrived. Beauty was on the top ibeam west corner of OCSR and DC was off hunting.

5 minutes later DC showed up on the 3rd ibeam west corner below the Beautyful one then he quickly flew off and landed on the southeast wing ring of the Times Square building (TSB).

I could see all 4 eyasses up at the nest box area-Nor’Easter on the nest box roof, Mercury on the well wall parapet and the girls on the deck. At 6:24am DC stooped down the south side of TSB and pulled out of it just before reaching Exchange Blvd. then back to the southeast wing ring.

DC flew off to the jail tower top arm north side a few minutes later, stayed there briefly then flew to the northeast wing ring. Beauty remained on OCSR.

Dan left at 7am and I went down to the hole where I was closer and could see the north end of the well wall.  Around 7:30am Beauty joined her kids and perched on the parapet while Mercury was at the north end of the wall and Nor’Easter got off the roof as reported by Annette. TY. Soon after Beauty went to cam 4 (thanks Annette and Donna for letting me know) and started preening as one of the kids followed suit and preened too.

DebbieH  joined me for a bit before going to work as DC took off going after something between the TSB and Philppone building-Beauty flew off to join him and we lost sight of them temporarily behind the building. When they resurfaced DC went to the Wilder green strip and Beauty to the heel of Mercury. At 7:58am DC flew over to the top ibeam west corner of OCSR.

All was quiet so I left to run a couple errands at 8:15am-one of my duties was to walk Jeannes’ dog, Isabella. I do this 3 times a week and I always check the Brighton Site on those days for any falcon activity-today there were 3 Turkey Vultures on the north side of the northeast extension.

<Click it

I returned to downtown at 10:20 to continue my fledge watch from the hole. DC was on the southwest wing ring and I could see 3 eyasses on deck then one of the boys went over to the parapet.

<Click it

It turned out to be Nor’Easter and he continued on to the north end of the well wall-Mercury followed behind his brother and when he reached Nor’Easter it got a bit nerve wrecking as they switched spots and Mercury almost went over the edge at least 2  or 3 times! ( I got it on video-scared me  a bit) Nor’E ran back toward the deck followed by Mercury but he changed his mind and turned around to go back to the end of the wall to scare me some more by flapping his wings very rapidly-I thought he was going to fly off!

At 11:07am all 4 were on the deck but Mercury just had to go run the wall again a couple minutes later.  I found DC on the top ibeam west corner of OCSR at 11:19am or so and then Donna (thanks) let me know that Beauty had been in the nest box for the last hour and was now on the deck where I couldn’t see her. Finally just before 11:30am Mercury returned to the deck with his siblings-of course he went to the front edge by the main cam to get me riled up again! lol

All 4 were together out on the front of the deck before settling down a few minutes later leaving my field of vision.

<Click it

This was the last sight I saw of them as I ended my watch at 11:45am with everything calm, just the way I like it. I had to smile as I left downtown after an exciting and fun first fledge watch! 🙂

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http://youtu.be/lfGrMYbWmUQ

http://youtu.be/ZzolR_bqQRs

http://youtu.be/4td023fGa-8

http://youtu.be/iCbKN9b4xRo

By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

At 63 (F) 17 (C) it  was calm,clear and warm with a blue moon as I stepped out the house for my watch.

Doesn’t look blue to me

Fellow falcon watcher, forum member and friend Ginny from New Jersey was to catch her train back home this morning at 9am. We went on a watch until I took her to the train station. We found Beauty on HSBC southeast corner as we approached from Court St.-as we pulled over on Chestnut St. to watch her she flew off to the northwest. We couldn’t find her or any other falcons around downtown so we went to Brighton and had the same results, Pigott wasn’t around either.Returning downtown we joined Larry and Harold at the High Falls. The Osprey was in the Falcon Sucking Tree (FST) with no PEFAs in sight.

Click my pics for full version

Larry left around the same time the Osprey flew off to the north side of the bridge landing in the island tree. A  few minutes after he left  the Osprey dove completely under water and came back up with a fish. A Great Blue Heron flew right over and tried to steal the catch of the day but the Osprey got away and flew to the High Falls side landing on driftwood on the floor of the gorge.

10 minutes later Ginny spotted a falcon on the Kodak Office launchpad northeast corner so we left and drove around to State St. to ID it. It was Dot.Ca (DC). He stooped off to the northwest out of sight after half hour.

We left there and checked out the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT). Parked on Church St. facing east I found Beauty on a north side beam in the middle of the bottom red section with food.

It was 8:30am and time to go to the train station-Ginny was thrilled that Beauty showed up before she had to leave. I returned to FCT a little after 9am and Beauty was still there and eating.

A man by the name of James stopped and spoke to me about our falcons. As he shook my hand and left he winked at me and said by the way my nickname is Birdy! How cool is that!? Anyway, Beauty ate her fill and remained perched on that beam very alert and very Beautyful as she kept an eye on the area. She walked to the east end of the beam and flew off to the east around 10:30am.

<Click it

She met up with a smaller falcon (DC?) and touched talons with it above the river and then they flew together in and out of view near the Andrews Place  Apartments before breaking it off. Beauty flew  back to FCT going to the middle of the metal work under the platform.

It was getting warm out and it was obvious Beauty was all comfy and ready to have a snooze so I left her, took a look around downtown with no PEFA sightings and ended my watch at 11:15am. I shared space with Beauty for a good amount of time this morning which placed a smile on this watchers face! 🙂

Click on the links below to see my photo album and some videos

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http://youtu.be/NvzfoXt9P5A
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By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood with a touch of humidity and a starting temperature of 59 (F) 15 (C) for the 3rd day in a row.

Ginny and I didn’t find a falcon until 6:30am when I spotted Beauty on the base of Mercury as she prepared a meal we saw feathers a flying.

Beauty stopped eating half hour later and flew off the north side with her food and we next found her on the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT) platform east side.After she pooped she started to eat.

DebbieH stopped by on her way to work to meet Ginny. After she left we heard whining and Ginny saw a falcon fly behind the large dish. We went over to the City Hall parking lot to see that it was Dot.Ca (DC) and he was eating.

Beauty had gone over to west side under platform.

At the time we thought Beauty was a juvie and DC was Beauty so my tweets are totally off from this time period.

< Click it <DC <Beauty

We left them to nap and checked Brighton but Pigott wasn’t home, so we returned to find the Beautyful one and the handsome one still napping in their same spots. Ginny wanted to go to High Falls so we did a search around town on our way there but found no juvies anywhere including the gorge. A few minutes later the Osprey flew in and landed in the Falcon Sucking Tree.

Ginny and I ended our watch around noon and went back out this evening at 6:30pm. We found Beauty on the southeast cube and DC was right below her on the top support beam for the large satellite dish on FCT.

DC flew off and back to land on the platform railing northeast corner.  KathyO joined us as we were in the City Hall parking lot followed by CarolP. Suddenly Kathy yelled there’s a falcon on the KO launchpad so we all thought juvie and raced over there to find an adult. We were like-then that must be a juvie instead of Beauty back on the FCT cube. The adult which looked small to me must have been a tiercel because it flew off headed straight for FCT.

KO bird

We all jumped in our cars and went back to FCT to find DC was gone but the cube bird was still there. Shaky and Carrie were there when we arrived. We all then went over to the Hochstein parking lot to get a front view of the falcon. Carol got out the scope and said she saw the red band on the right leg telling us that it was Voyager. Larry came by with Harold as every one of us looked at that bird and didn’t notice that it was not a juvie. It wasn’t until I downloaded my pics on my computer for tonights report that I could clearly see that it was Beauty.

So unfortunately we had no juvie sightings today and hopefully DC chased the unknown falcon out of the territory without incident. We all packed it in after Beauty flew southeast  around 8:30pm as it was getting dark out. One thing that made me smile today was Beauty and DC hanging out with each other so much! 🙂

Click on the links below for more pics and videos

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By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Today was a carbon copy of yesterday with a starting temp of 59 (F)  15 (C) with calm sun-sational conditions.

Ginny and I started our watch at 6am and found Beauty on HSBC at the southeast corner. She flew off 15 minutes later and circled above Xerox several times before vanishing behind it. We found her 5 minutes later on the top arm west side of the jail tower.

Ginny wanted to go look for juvies so we did but didn’t find any and ended up at the pedestrian bridge at High Falls at 7:10am. Larry was there but leaving to go to work and said that Dan had just left. There were no juvies in the area but our gorge Osprey flew in and landed on the Falcon Sucking Tree (FST). It appeared to have a full crop.

We left and went over to the Brighton site but Pigott was not at home either.  We returned to downtown and found Voyager, who seems to be the only juvie in town, on the lower roof ledge of Widows Walk  north side. She had food and judging by the color (no red) I’d say it was cached food.

She finished the meager amount in a few minutes then she flew off circling back around and landed on the southwest corner of Widows Walk below the railing.

Miss Voyager stayed but a minute then flew north right over our heads and we weren’t able to find her again. After a lengthy search of downtown with no PEFA sightings I took Ginny to Charlotte Pier to check out  Lake Ontario. She was amazed that it was a lake saying it looked like the Atlantic Ocean. We walked out to the end of it and saw lots on the way.

We cruised back to downtown afterwards and found Beauty and Voyager on the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT). Beauty was hidden well and a fully cropped Voyager kept moving around in the middle of the structure.

<Find Beauty <Voyager in a food coma lol

They were napping so I took Ginny to Wild Wings where we checked out all their beautiful birds of prey and we took a walk down the trail to feed the Chickadees out of our hands. That’s always a treat! We also checked Irondequoit Bay -nothing but gulls and ducks seen there.

We made our way back out for an evening watch around 6pm. We found Beauty and Dot.Ca (DC) on the Kodak Office playpen. The Beautyful one was at the southeast corner and DC was at the north east corner. DC flew off when we weren’t looking.

We ran into KathyO by FCT and chatted for a bit and then we left to check for Pigott. We didn’t find her or any other falcons for the remainder of our watch. We had a great day with lots of laughs which makes for big old smiles! 🙂

Click on the links below to see more pics and videos

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By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

It has already been reported what happened this weekend, so I’ll just add some pictures I took.  The weather was gorgeous and it was  really nice meeting our friend Ginny from NJ.  🙂

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8/19/13 – Monday Night Report

Beauty was on the SE corner of the playpen on the Kodak Tower.  Lisa joined me on the pedestrian bridge for a short watch.  Kathy O, Ginny and MAK were also downtown during my short evening watch.

Lisa and I did see a falcon eating on the SW corner of Midtown for a few moments.  To far to ID if it was a juvie or adult.

Goodnight everyone!

By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Picture perfect weather here in Rochester lately-calm,sunny and warm. It started out at 59 (F) 15 (C) for the morning watchers and just got better as time went on.

Todays watch was all about the lovely Miss Voyager. Ginny and I started the day with her and spent most of the day with her. City Hall was our starting point with a juvie on the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT) platform railing. Ginny was itching to meet the Beautyful one so I drove us over to the east side where we found Beauty on HSBC northwest corner. We also had a juvie on Midtown.

They both took off and we headed over to High Falls where we met Dan and Larry on the pedestrian bridge. They had a falcon on Chase. I spotted 2 talon tagging over by the Radisson and they continued across the river behind OCSR where we lost one  and the other went to the Kodak Office (KO) launchpad.

I saw my first Eastern Kingbird in the river tree on the north side of the bridge.

Dan and Larry left a little after 8am as Ginny and I went over by KO and ID’d that bird as Beauty. She didn’t stay long before she stooped out of view.

Next stop was Brighton where we found Pigott on the front edge of the cubby-Ginny was excited to meet her as well. She just kept saying she’s so pretty! And well, she is so pretty!!! She had a feather stuck to her forehead which we call a fascinator  around here. Pigott went in the cubby for a few minutes then came back out for a minute before flying up to the southwest corner of the west extension.

Miss Pigott would leave us after an hour when we weren’t looking. We made our way back downtown around 10:30am and found Beauty on the FCT north side under the platform. We then had Voyager on Widows Walk below railing on the north side and we would see her for most of the rest of our watch. After hanging out with her on Fitzhugh St. she flew off to the north then we went up on the Sister Cities garage to watch from there so we could see both Beauty and Voyager.

Voyager went to FCT landing under the platform south side and right after we believe it was Dot.Cs (DC) who flew out and went east. Carol was down at City Hall at this time and we went down to join her as Dana was also there. Lisa came by for a few minutes as well.

<Voyager> <Beauty>

Things would remain like this for 3 hours or so and in that time watchers that joined us were Linda (Braveheart),Bill and KrisG when Voyager finally spotted Beauty below her and started screaming ay=t which point Beauty flew off to the south and a few minutes later Voyager flew north at 3:05pm.

Hey I see you down there mom

We then heard whining and a falcon shot out from FCT to the north. Next we heard whining over at City Place where we believed DC dropped food off to Voyager and skidaddled to the northeast. Voyager started eating then stopped and went down to a lower roof on the back of City Place and got another chunk of food and started eating again. She flew over to FCT with it soon after and finished it off there.

Voyager moved up in the tower just as we were getting ready to leave.

All the watchers left so Ginny and I decided to go to High Falls to end our marathon watch. There were no falcons there but we had 4 explorers down in the gorge hiking to the island and back. We also had a cute little bat fly past us a couple times when Dan followed by Joyce and Larry all filtered onto the pedestrian bridge with us. Dan spotted the gorge Osprey on the concrete support north side of the bridge. He made an attempt at catching a fish but missed and went to the north side tree to let his wings drip dry a bit before heading over to a bigger tree on the northwest shore.

That’s all she wrote-Ginny and I left at 6:45pm over 12 hours after we started this morning with smiles on our tired faces for we’d had a very fun watch! 🙂

Click on the links below to see more picks and videos from the day

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http://youtu.be/BPFOgut602o
http://youtu.be/MBC2lUhveyg
http://youtu.be/tP9EscSvYRg
http://youtu.be/xB_Jj3wR5iE

By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Another banner day weather wise in our fair city with sunshine and blue skies. When I left the house at 5:45am the temp was 56 (F) 13 (C)

After checking the west and north sides of the city I ended up finding 2 falcons on the east side. Beauty was on the northwest corner of HSBC and there was a juvie on Midtown with its back to me. I believe it was one of the girls.

After 20 minutes the juvie was gone having left when I wasn’t looking. 5 minutes later Beauty flew off toward the west.

A check of downtown turned up nothing so Isabella and I went to the pedestrian bridge at High Falls. Dan was already there and Larry pulled up right after me with Harold. Dan found what looked like Dot.Ca (DC) on the north corner top ibeam of OCSR at 6:45am.

At 7am we noticed DC gone and half hour later he showed up on the northeast corner of the Kodak Office (KO)launchpad. At the same time I looked down on the north side of the bridge to see the Osprey in the island tree.

There were lots of fish coming to the surface of the river to snatch a bug and after 5 minutes or so our Osprey friend dove down and snatched one of those fish and flew northwest, doubled back toward us and went under the bridge where we lost sight of it.

While we were watching DC left KO and so Dan and Larry decided to call it a watch at around 7:45am. I left and stopped on the Andrews St. Bridge where I spotted DC eating on a brick building that is for lease by the Philipone people on State. St. across from the Rochester Plaza Hotel. Beauty has also been seen eating on this same building in the past. As I was parking he moved back on the ledge where I could only see his head and that heart shaped malar stripe.

A few minutes later he came back out in plain view and started eating his small package again. It looked fresh so I assume he caught it off of KO.

You must click on my pics to see the full version

A few minutes later he stopped eating and walked 10 ft to the south, stopped and started looking around.

A couple minutes of that and he was off to the northeast out of view.The next series of pics is the progression of his take off.

Click it

I drove straight down State St. and found DC on the KO  launchpad northeast corner again.

I left DC and checked downtown to no avail so I drove to Brighton where I had the same result-no PEFAs. I returned to downtown and found only one falcon-the Beautyful one! I went to the hole (Aqueduct St. ) where I could see only the top half of her and what a gorgeous top half it is!

She was on the top ibeam west corner of OCSR and it was time for me to leave so I ended my watch at 9am. I would like to have seen all 3 juvies but hopefully tonight they will be around when I pick up New Jersey forum member Ginny Karyn  from the train station who is going to be staying with me until Wednesday. There will definitely be smiles if that happens! 🙂

I have only one video link today-just click and view

http://youtu.be/cj5E43MSbMI

By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

What a gorgeous afternoon/evening.  Temps in the 70’s (F) with a soft breeze, blue sky and sunshine.  Lots of folks were out on the pedestrian bridge, enjoying the weather, the beautiful view of the High Falls and the birds.  So many people stopped to talk to us about the falcons, asking how they were doing.  The Osprey visited too, allowing good looks to all that passed by.  What kind of bird is that?  It was fun talking to everyone.

When I first arrived just before 4:00 p.m., both Beauty and Dot.ca were on the Kodak Tower.  They changed positions a couple times, ending up with Beauty on the SE corner of the playpen and Dot.ca on the corner of the launchpad.

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After checking out downtown and not finding any juvies, I parked at the east end of the pedestrian bridge.  I was there for over and hour before I decided to walk over to the Kodak Tower for a closer look.  I was looking directly into the sun and I wasn’t sure if Beauty and Dot.ca were still there.  I found a spot where I was in the shade and I could see both of them.  Beauty on the SE corner of the playpen and Dot.ca on the SE corner of the launchpad.  Now that I was closer, I could hear a juvie vocalizing from somewhere on the KTower.  I looked all over and could not find the juvie.  It was time to head back to the pedestrian bridge.

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On my way back to the pedestrian bridge, I took a few pics of local interest, for those that want to learn about Rochester’s history.  Did you know that we were called the Flour City in the past, not to be confused with the Flower City.  The High Falls area was the location of many mills that used the river to turn the millstones that made the flower, oops, I mean flour.  lol

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Here’s the history of the pedestrian bridge that the Rochester Falcon Watchers love to watch falcons from.

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and don’t even ask me why there is a giant chair??? set-up at the west end of the pedestrian bridge.  Not really sure what this is supposed to be.  Any ideas?

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Toronto St, in front of the Kodak Tower.  Could this be why so many of our young falcons end up there?  lol

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I made my way back to the pedestrian bridge and spotted a familiar face at the east end.  Dan S had joined the Watch.  We were soon joined by Lisa McK and Larry O.  Dot.ca and the juvie we couldn’t find on the Kodak Tower took off and flew high over head.  Soaring higher and higher.  Now and then the juvie would catch up and they would touch talons.  Then DC would continue to gain altitude and the juvie followed.  Wish I knew which juvie it was.

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It looked like school was in session for the young falcon.  Dot.ca was taking him up for some high flying lessons.  We lost sight of them.  Beauty remained on the SE corner of the playpen on the Kodak Tower.

An Osprey had flown into the gorge landing in the Falcon Sucking Tree on the east side of the gorge.  Her wings were wet and she held them out to dry them and preen.  After awhile, she flew under the bridge and landed on the island tree on the north side of the bridge.  There is a small island with one tree growing there.  The ducks and the geese usually use it.  Today there were a few ducks on the island.  The Osprey landed on a very thin branch that stuck up from the top of the tree.  For most of the time we were on Watch, the Osprey remained in that tree preening and watching the river below.  We thought for sure she would fish, but she was content to just watch.  She eventually launched herself from the thin branch and headed north down the river.

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It was 8:0o pm and there was a chill in the air.  We all decided it was time to end our Watch.  By this time, Beauty had left the KTower.  No one has seen her leave.  I decided to check out the downtown area one last time before heading home.  Dana and Lou were just pulling into the parking lot when we were leaving.  They told us that there was a falcon on the top arm of the Frontier Communication Tower (FCT).  That’s where we headed.  It was Beauty and she was facing south.  Above us were 100’s of gulls flying over.  Beauty took off and we found her on the south side of  OCSR at the south corner.

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I drove around the downtown area and could find no other falcons.  It was time to head home.  I’ll leave you with a picture I took of the beautiful sunset from the pedestrian bridge.  The weekend is here and I truly hope that the juvies will be out and about for the Watchers to see.  Goodnight everyone!