A Saturday Falcon Watch – Beauty & Pigott & Tiercel? & KPF – 2/16/13
By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.
After not seeing any falcons yesterday, I was happy to see 4 of them today.
Downtown, I eventually found Beauty on the 2nd arm down on the Frontier Communication Tower (FCT).
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I watched Beauty from the Andrews St Bridge (ASB). Downtown Rochester was again extremely busy. Buses lined most of the streets, making it very difficult to find spots to watch falcons from. Beauty took off and stooped low to the north and up again. She swung around and headed south towards the Times Square Bldg (TSB). I followed the best I could. By the time I got close to the TSB, I had lost her. It was time to search again. I circled the TSB and then headed down Broad St towards the Xerox Bldg, B&L, HSBC and the deconstructed Midtown Plaza. From there, I looked back at the TSB and found that Beauty was there on the SW corner, opposite from the nest box location.
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It was time for me to go to the BS location, hoping to find Pigott and BST (who had not been seen since Thursday). MAK and Dana had both been there this morning and had only seen Pigott. When I got there, I found Pigott on the west side of the building near the nook (a ledge they have shown some interest in). I continued to search the rest of the building, but could not find BST. Was he gone? Was he possibly a migrating tiercel that had started his journey home to his own mate? This was something the Watchers had wondered when he showed up this winter. But, there was no way to know for sure.
I spent quite a bit of time watching Pigott, hoping that BST would return. She had a very large crop and she was very sleepy.
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There was a gaggle of Canada Geese below her, grazing on the exposed grass, now that the snow had melted a bit. Every now and then she would open her eyes and look down at these large birds. I even found BSK (BS Kitty) wandering around.
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Lisa McK visited with me for awhile before she had to leave. Pigott became very interested in something that I couldn’t see. She stood up and spread her wings and hunkered down and took off.
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Pigott flew up and met another falcon that had just flow in, a smaller falcon, a tiercel. They greeted each other with loud ee-chups and touched talons. They flew together for a few seconds before the tiercel continued flying north. Pigott followed, but stopped, landing on the NW corner. She and I watched the tiercel continue his flight towards downtown. Hmmm, that was interesting. To me, there was no aggression in their meeting, it was more of a greeting. Different than how she behaved when BST flew in. My first thought was “did DC return?”
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Pigott looking north after the tiercel left BS.
I decided it was time to return downtown. After searching I found Beauty on top of the Xerox Tower on the south side, 5th column in from the SE corner. She was looking south.
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Beauty on Xerox looking south.
Had Beauty seen the tiercel? Where was he. I never saw him again during my watch.
I went back to the BS location, leaving Brian to keep an eye on Beauty.
When I arrived at BS, Dana and Lou were there. Pigott was now on the south side of the west extension. Close to where she had been before the tiercel flew through. We were soon joined by Joyce and Steve.
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After awhile, I decided it was time to head home. My route took me through downtown where I found Beauty finishing a meal on top of the TSB at the base of the SE wing. She took off and flew to the back of the building landing at the base of the SW, again looking south.
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I passed by the apartments on Lake Ave, where we had been seeing a falcon for the past few days. There was no falcon there now. Joyce & Steve did see one there later in the day.
My last stop before going home was KP, where I found a falcon sitting on the west side of the catwalk on the west smokestack. Looked like the one I had seen there a couple days ago. Bright white chest and dark helmet. Was this the same one that was visiting the Lake Ave apartments? So many questions.
BE SURE TO CLICK ON ANY PICS YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE IN A LARGER FORMAT.
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The Rochester Falcon Watchers will definitely be keeping their eyes to the sky! There is so much happening now.
