By Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

It was breezy, partly cloudy and warm with a balmy, starting temperature of 45 (F) 7 (C)

Seneca Towers has been getting heavy vents and supplies placed on the roof by a huge crane the past few days so Billie and Seth have not been around lately.

Click on the pics to see the full version

After no success at finding them I left for downtown and from the Andrews St. bridge (ASB) I spotted who, I think was Dot.ca (DC) on the northeast corner of City Place. By the time I got over there he was gone.

As I was turning onto State St. I spotted Beauty flying west from over the Holiday Inn, State St.  and the Sister Cities Parking Garage. I lost her and when I stopped I spotted DC over on the north corner top I-beam of OCSR. After a few minutes he flew off right over me and took the same route as the Beautyful one.

I drove around and around looking for them but never did find them. I stopped on the Court St. bridge to check life down in the river and found that the east side bank was being landscaped by a couple earth movers. There were gulls flying and hanging out on a frozen part of the river below.

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I left and checked the Brighton site with no luck. However, on the way over I watched a Red-tail Hawk land on a light pole. It was in hunt mode as it kept watching for rodents below it. He dove down and came back up with a talon full of grass and a mouse. He proceeded to another pole to eat his lunch and I might add, made quick work of it in a minute or so.

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I returned to downtown a while later and again from the ASB I spotted both Beauty and DC side by side on the northeast corner of City Place. And once again when I got there they were gone. You gotta love falcon games. I suspect there was food on the roof and they were jumping down to it out of my sight.  I headed home and as I was driving down Norton St. I watched a Merlin land on a power pole. Merlins are also falcons, a bit larger than an American Kestrel, (also a falcon) and smaller than Peregrines. I knew it was a falcon by the way it flew and the shape of its wings.

This Merlin was in hunt mode as he looked in every direction. He pooped a couple times and stretched his wings while I shared space with him. I haven’t seen very many Merlins in my travels so I watched him for a bit until I had to move my car. When I looked again it was gone!

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When I got home at 3:30pm there was no crane and no falcons. I ended my watch smiling after a fun little watch! 🙂

Click on the links below to see today’s videos

https://youtu.be/7K_b-EBsNu8

https://youtu.be/dhGd9RaRmQM

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 11th, 2017 at 7:37 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.