By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

The starting temperature this morning was 60 (F) 16 (C) with hazy sunshine

Please click on my pics to see the full version

I found Beauty on the northeast corner of HSBC to start my watch-she didn’t stay long (2 minutes to be exact) before flying northeast out of view.

20 minutes later while parked on the Broad St. Bridge (BSB) I spotted a falcon on the top arm of the jail tower with its back to me. I took a pic and left for Troup St. where I could get a front view-it was Beauty. Again, she didn’t stay long and flew off just before the 7 o’clock hour to the southwest over Cornhill.

I looked but never found the Beautyful one. After checking around downtown I stopped on the Court St. bridge around 7:30am to check out the river. I’m glad I did for I spotted not one but two Black-crowned Night Herons hunting under the BSB. One of them caught what looked like a crayfish/crawfish and was trying to soften it up to swallow it down when the other heron rushed it. Obviously, it wanted to steal the prize but failed as the other guy flew off with it. I shot a video of it all taking place.

Both herons flew down river out of view so I drove over to the BSB where I found one of them hunting near the RG&E sub-station.

Now it was time to look for falcons from the Andrews St. Bridge-bingo, I spotted one on the 3rd ibeam northwest side. I went down to State St. across from the Rochester Plaza Hotel to observe Dot.Ca (DC) with fresh prey.

He flew off with it after a couple minutes and took it to the Frontier Communications Tower (FCT). I literally chased after him in my car, and it was a good thing because where he landed with it I might not have found him so easily as if I hadn’t watched him land from Church and Fitzhugh St. DC was on the beam that supports the northeast and southeast cubes behind the large disk.

DC had a little nibble of his catch but I really think he took it there thinking a juvie would show up to eat for he left with it after 5 minutes or so. He flew southeast out of sight and I wasn’t able to locate him again. I ended up on the Pont de Rennes pedestrian bridge where all I found was a Great Blue Heron down in the river on the north side preening.

I left there to take one more trip around the city-I found Beauty tucked in a northeast corner of FCT. She was trying to nap while a robin was yapping at her.

I never found any juvies and ended my watch at about 10am. I sure would like to see the girls as they haven’t been seen in quite a few days. Perhaps they’ll show themselves tomorrow. As I approached Seneca Towers (home) I spotted Veteran on the west corner of the railing on top of the roof.

Seeing 3 adult Peregrine Falcons is enough to make me smile! 🙂

Click on the links below to view todays videos
http://youtu.be/VrdfhaXE6YQ
http://youtu.be/q8o0EzzHBpQ
http://youtu.be/8hruP9ySzQA
http://youtu.be/fF2Ay3XysfY
http://youtu.be/o-Kl9sGSwMU
http://youtu.be/g-H7_6a0oX4
http://youtu.be/8zcuFoRF-4M

This entry was posted on Monday, August 11th, 2014 at 5:54 PM and is filed under Fledge Watch. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.