By Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

My normal daily late afternoon falcon watch turned out to be a very exciting watch today.  The sun was so bright, and the sky so blue, it was hard for me to see much from the Broad St Bridge.  But, I could see that there was a falcon inside the nest box on the Times Square Bldg (TSB).  Well that was new.  It had been a very long time since I’d seen a falcon there.  Since before winter.  I quickly tweeted in what I saw and moved my car a little closer to the building.  Still the sun made it hard to see.

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It was Beauty in the nest box, but, I found out pretty quickly that she wasn’t alone.  I kept seeing what appeared to be a very small and extremely fast falcon flitting back and forth.  So fast!  Finally the tiercel (male falcon) flew back and forth above Beauty at the nest box.  I finally had two Peregrines in my field of vision.  Yes!  TWEET!  WE HAVE TWO!  Time to head down to Aqueduct St aka “The Hole”, where I would be closer to the TSB and able to escape the bright sunlight.

I immediately started receiving texts from other Watchers saying they were on their way.  I was soon joined by Pat, Kathy O, Lisa McK, Joyce and MAK.  Using my scope and viewing pics being taken, we were able to verify that this tiercel that I am calling UT (Unbanded Tiercel) for the time being, was unbanded.  Hopefully he’ll stay around and we’ll give him a proper name.

Beauty had been eating up at the base of the SE wing on the TSB soon after I arrived.  UT had picked it up multiple times throughout the watch and was either flying around with it trailing behind him or eating some of it himself on the OCSR.  We all wondered if this had been a food gift for Beauty to show her what a great hunter he was.  He landed in so many different spots that we rarely see falcons land on.

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When the Crows started flowing into the city past the TSB, Beauty would tear after them, UT right behind her.  He was determined to help her rid “their” territory of all undesirables.  Beauty is fast when she wants to be, but UT is turbo charged fast.  Unbelievable!  If you blinked, you would miss him.  The gathered Watchers were amazed by his flying abilities.

For the approximately 3 hours I was there tonight, it was pretty much non-stop activity by Beauty & UT.  Here are some flight shots I took of UT during my Watch.

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I’ll leave you with some other pics I took before it got too dark to see anything.  Before we left, Beauty was on Mercury and we weren’t sure where UT was.  The last time we saw him, he had been flying around the OCSR.  By the time we got back to our cars to leave, Beauty was no longer on Mercury.

I cannot wait to get downtown tomorrow morning to continue to observe this pair!  I’m sure my fellow Watchers will be out and about also.

BE SURE TO CLICK ON ANY PICTURES YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE LARGER

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This entry was posted on Friday, March 8th, 2013 at 10:45 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.