By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

Date : 5/17/12 (Thursday)
Time: 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Weather: Sunny and Cooler than in past days. Temps in the 60’s. A beautiful day!
Watcher: Dan, Kathy O, Brian H, Lou, Dana & Carol P.
Places: Downtown Rochester (Times Square Nestsite) (TS)
Peregrines Seen: Beauty (at TSB) & Dot.ca (at TSB)
Beauty = B
Dot.ca = DC
Pigott = P (the female falcon formerly known as SA or Sub Adult at BS Location)
Times Square Bldg = TSB
Brighton Site = BS
Broad St Bridge = BSB
Baush & Lomb Bldg = B&L Bldg
Old Changing Scenes Restaurant = OCSR

Now that we are with egg, many of the Watchers gathered on the Broad St Bridge tonight to watch the falcons and to talk excitedly about the possibility of young falcons here in Rochester this year. Believe me, we are NOT counting our eyases before they are hatched, but we can’t help hoping that they will.

When I first arrived, Kathy, Dan and Brian pointed out a falcon on the level above the nest box, right in the center. They weren’t sure if it was B or DC. That question was answered fairly quickly when we spotted a falcon flying in from the east. We spotted the split wing tip on the right wing. I never thought I would say that to describe Beauty in flight. That was something that helped us ID Mariah most of the many years we watched her. Beauty flew up to the platform of the nest box and remained there throughout our watch. While we watched Beauty fly in, we lost sight of Dot.ca who had been the falcon on the level above the nest box. No one saw him leave, but it was nice to know that while Beauty was away from the nest, Dot.ca kept watch over their egg. Oh, and Larry O had reported a Falcon at the BS location just before I arrived, so he probably saw Pigott there, while DC was on the TSB.

Dana and Lou joined us and we settled in to watch the daring folks repelling down the OCSR building we were so used to seeing falcons on, not humans acting like Batman and Robin in the old series I watched as a kid. I kept thinking they should be stopping and talking to people through the windows on their way down. Hahaha! Some of them were just being lowered and some were actually putting their feet on the building and “walking” down. We would say “Hey, look! He’s on the top IBeam! It actually does look like a lot of fun! 🙂

For the two hours we were there, Beauty did not move from the nest box and Dot.ca did not return (that we knew of). So watching the Crow on the river rocks below using the river water to try to soften the stale piece of pizza he found to be able to eat it and seeing a small raccoon walking up and down the river bank was our entertainment for the night. Mind you, I am not complaining. The good company of my fellow Watchers and the peacefulness of watching Beauty at the nest box with her egg was all we needed.

We of course will all be out again to keep an eye on our Rochester Falcons and we’ll report what we see. So, remember, keep your eyes to the sky. Sometimes it just nice to look up and see a Peregrine at rest, preening and dozing. Sometimes that’s the very best. 🙂

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 17th, 2012 at 10:12 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.