By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Today the starting temperature was 51 (F) 11 (C) and could be the last nice day for a while as rain is in the forecast tomorrow with cooler temps moving in. It will be more like spring the next week or so. Saw just a sliver of the moon on my way down Maple St.

Arriving downtown this morning around 5:30am I was pleasantly surprised that Exchange Blvd. wasn’t blocked and I could get to the hole (Aqueduct St.) so I went straight over there to watch for the first egg switch of the day. I had a long wait for Dot.Ca (DC) was doing other things first thing this morning.

1 1/2 hours later I saw a tiercel fly in from the east above the Thomson Reuters and Philipone buildings up to the northeast wing of the Times Square building (TSB)and disappear. I tweeted that it was DC but I’m not so sure it was him. I was too close to see the back of the ledge from the hole so I drove up to the Broad St. Bridge (BSB) but there was nobody under any of the wings. I checked around the east,west and north side of the territory without finding a falcon so I went to the Brighton site. Bingo-as I approached the site I could see a large falcon on the northwest corner. When I pulled down the service road it vanished. I stopped on the west side near the cubby and out of the corner of my eye I spotted somebody on the northwest corner which was kinda behind me. I cranked my head around and took the first falcon pic of the day at 7:40am. Good morning Miss Pigott!

Click on my pics for a larger version

I thought we were alone and started to back up to have an easier angle in which to observe but as I was in the process DC came blazing in from the southwest and mated with Pigott. I couldn’t stop and get the camera focused on them in time as they both flew off out of view immediately afterwards. I drove to the south side (back) of building and found Pigott on the west end of the south side vent but DC was nowhere to be found.

She was back on it a bit eating at first and when she was finished she walked over to the side where I had a better view of her.

The reason I didn’t see DC is because he had left for downtown as I received messages from both Donna and Annette saying that he had finally relieved Beauty and was on the eggs. Thank you very much ladies!  I stayed with Pigott for 10 more minutes and then I left for downtown.  I went to the Court St. bridge where I could see the Beautyful one on the base of Mercury, and let me tell ya the feathers were flying!! She was all business getting to this meal after such a long sit on the eggs.

Beauty turned away from me after 10 minutes so I drove over to the hole to share space with her. She was done preparing and now eating her long awaited meal.

She went for the first leg and gulped that down and then the second one. I don’t know how they swallow them but they manage it. GULP!

When Beauty was finished dining she flew off and I next saw her soaring high above the river drifting east until I lost her in the big Beautyful sky! I resurfaced from the hole to have a look around for her but she was nowhere in sight. I chose to end my watch at that point around 9:15am. Tho it was less than 10 seconds that I saw DC over at BS it still counts as I saw all 3 of our Rochester Peregrine Falcons putting a smile on this watchers face! 🙂

To view more pics and videos all you need do is click on the links below

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0AaN3DFm0ZMWrf_g

http://youtu.be/AiyMK9mXzaQ
http://youtu.be/dmkE-93STx8
http://youtu.be/sADX_ay_R9E
http://youtu.be/RSZZ9WOTTmE

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 7th, 2013 at 1:05 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.