By Rochester falcon watcher MAK

Boy what a full day of fun with my fellow falcon flakes after a long housebound week!  The day started with CarolP picking me up for a morning watch. We found the Beautyful one on the Kodak Office tower perched atop the right side arch above where the nest box used to be. The streets were not plowed too well and while we were turning around to get a good look at her she left. We had no idea what direction she went in so we searched for a while to no avail. Carol decided we’d go to Charlotte to see what we could see and as we were near Irondequoit Mall she thought we might as well check there first. Bad decision for there were no falcons there and we ran into a median that was completely covered with snow as the parking lot had not been plowed. We ended up with the front tires off the ground and the underside of the car resting on the concrete curb. unfortunately the car was front-wheel drive so I knew we weren’t going to go antwhere without a tow. I asked if Carol had AAA and so she called them. They said it would be an hour so I did my best to keep her laughing and not be too upset over it for I didn’t see any damage. In the meantime watcher Lynda texted me and asked if I wanted to go on a watch with her. I told her the situation and she came over to sit with us and wait for help. 2 hours later the tow truck showed up and freed Carols’ car.

I hopped in Lyndas’ car and we followed Carol to her dealer to get it checked out. She went home while Lynda and I went downtown to join Brian and Joyce who were watching Beauty on the money bag hand of Mercury.

Lynda and I went to KP after this and told Brian and Joyce who had a couple errands to do that we would meet them in Charlotte to look for the Snowy Owl. After only a few minutes I spotted Unity flying in from the east and we watched her fly to the blue building and land on a ledge just below the roof top. She flew off and landed on the same ledge a bit further down to the right.

I called security to let them know we were there and the guy said can I ask you a question about the birds all serious like and I said yes, what do you want to know? He said when it gets real cold out like this do they put on clothes or booties  for you to see! LOL I laughingly said no but they do foof up their feathers to keep warm and we both had a good laugh. Lynda and I didn’t stay long for we were losing light quickly and so we went to Charlotte. We arrived before Joyce and Brian and found the female Snowy Owl across the river on the Summerville pier about half way out just beyond the rocks. It was a long distance and not much light so my pics are of poor quality.

I n took a couple pics of the ice that had formed on the Charlotte pier railing.  Lynda was way behind me cuz it was brutally cold out on the pier.

I could see Brian,Joyce and her dogs had arrived and were walking out to join me. My fingers were getting painfully cold so I snapped a couple more pics of the owl and headed back to join Lynda in her warm car. She was too cold to come out with us on the pier. Lynda brought my attention to a pair of long-tailed ducks in the river as I walking up to meet her.

A few more pics of our resident female Snowy Owl which Lynda thinks we should name Summer cuz she hangs out in Summerville so much.

When Brian and Joyce came back to the car I asked if everyone wanted to come to my house for coffee. So as the sun was setting on this watchers day we left with a smile on our faces. 🙂

Rochester Falcon Watcher MAK

Joyce and Brian picked me up at the airport and we went downtown to find Beauty and then we went to KP and found Unity. We then took a ride to Irondequoit where we found a pefa on a light pole on the bay bridge. Next stop was Summerville where we spotted the female Snowy Owl on the coast guard antenna. Not a bad watch for my first one of the year if I do say so myself! Click the link below for a small album of the days pics and keep on smiling every one of you!

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=407222144213%3A608152255

MAK

Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

My weekend Falcon Watch continues. It was much colder today, but lots of sunshine, so it made it tolerable.

Thankfully watching from my car is an option. Although the Falcon Flakes have been known to be out and about on the most frigid days. But, I was fighting a sore throat and didn’t want to make it worse. My Watch would be shorter today.

After getting some coffee, the $1 for a large special from McD’s, and a free small coffee (it was Customer Appreciation day) I headed to Kodak Park. I would never say no to a free coffee. 🙂

I immediately spotted Unity on the blue bldg that held her scrape. She was on the top ledge standing in front of her shadow. She didn’t stay long. Unity walked down the length of the ledge and took off, heading east. I watched her swoop up into the “pigeon box”. It was a large square hollow structure at the end of a chute. The only entrance is from below and there are beams for pigeons and falcons to sit on.

Probably pretty comfy up there on a cold, windy day and dry if it rains or snows.
She pooped and settled, so I decided to head downtown to look for Beauty. First stop Kodak Office and the surrounding High Falls area.

No sign of Beauty here. I watched as a city truck drove down the pedestrian bridge we used to Watch from. Did you know that this bridge used to be open to two-way traffic? I’ve been on that bridge when a bunch of people have walked out onto it and you can feel it “bounce”. They closed it to car traffic sometime in the 70’s I believe.

OK, onward. I checked all over downtown for close to 2 hours and could not find Beauty. Kathy O arrived and she could not find her either. The good news is that Brian H, Joyce and MAK did see Beauty on a “disk” on top of a ramp garage near Kodak Office later in the afternoon. She was not there earlier when I was looking for her. This spot was very unusual for Beauty, but I had seen Mariah and many juvies up there.

It was time for me to go. Kathy and I checked out Kodak Park one more time since it was on my way home. Unity was still up inside the “pigeon box”. Time for me to go!

You can check out some pics I took today in a KGallery album. No sign on needed.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=2935820621105%3A169511845

Enjoy!
Carol P.

Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

After a really not very nice week at work, I was ready for some downtime. And what better way to spend it? Looking for Falcons of course! I didn’t get going until 10 a.m.

The sun was shining. The sky was unbelievably blue. Temps in the 40’s. No snow. No rain. No sleet. It was the perfect Saturday and I was going to take full advantage of it.

My first stop, Kodak Park. I arrived at 10 a.m. and found Unity sitting on top of the tall still. She flew back to the tank-like structure behind the stills and landed on a large pipe, where she remained until I left.

Next stop, downtown Rochester. At 11:20 a.m., I found Beauty on top of the Times Square Bldg. She was just below the NE “wing”, directly above the nest box. At 11:50 a.m., she took off and headed west.

Of course it was the opposite direction to where I was located on the east side.
I headed in that direction, ending up in Susan B. Anthony’s neighborhood. I so admire the statue of Susan B. and Frederick Douglas having tea in the park on the street that Susan B’s house is located. It’s lovely.

I checked all the buildings in the area and couldn’t find Beauty.

Back to Kodak Park, where I found Unity back on the tall still. Kathy O joined me and soon, Unity took off heading west. She flew low in front of the buildings and we quickly lost sight of her. Kathy and I both went looking for her, but couldn’t find her.

We decided to check for the Peregrines we had seen on the old Railroad Bridge at Charlotte (NY).

We arrived at Charlotte around 2 p.m. No luck finding the falcons, but we were very happy to find a Snowy Owl sitting on top of the closed Carousel building. We drove over and I took a few pictures. Dana and Lou joined us.

After awhile, I said my goodbyes and headed home. It was a very GOOD day, spent with good friends and seeing two Peregrines and a Snowy wasn’t too shabby! 🙂

I’ve put together a KGallery album with pictures from today. No sign on needed.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=2627727521105%3A129153733

Enjoy!
Carol P.

From Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P. – 12/31/11

Happy New Year everyone!

My New Years Eve Falcon watch started out with my neighborhood Church Hawks. This is a local pair of Red-tail Hawks that nest near where I live. Every now and then I’ll find one or both on the cross of a church down the street from where I live. I’m pretty sure they had only one baby last year.

Next stop was Kodak Park. No luck finding Unity. Kathy O had seen her yesterday afternoon, so she was definitely still in the area.

Onward to downtown Rochester. At about 10:30 am, I found Beauty on the Frontier Communication Tower (FCT) under the platform. This was a favorite perch for her. I was soon joined by Dana. Between 10:30 am and 1:00 pm, when I left, Beauty remained on the FCT except for flying off once to chase some pigeons and return. Shaky turned pancam towards FCT to allow the Rfalconcam friends to view Beauty.

I had to do some grocery shopping and when I left a very busy Wegmans, my cell phone rang. It was a very excited Dana. She was down at Charlotte and there were two Peregrine Falcons on the old railroad swing bridge. Well guess where I headed next? 🙂

I soon joined Dana and Kathy O at Charlotte and for a couple hours we watched this obviously bonded pair tandem hunt pigeons and ducks and an occasional thump on a gull.

We believe this is the same pair we had previously been watching at the Irondequoit Mall. They are both unbanded and their coloring is very close to Mariah and Kaver’s. White over the cere and flattish head on the female and a very dark helmet on the Tiercel (male).

Could this be Charbay, our wintering female that hung out in Charlotte last year? We even started wondering if the Tiercel might be Mr. T. I know that we’ll be looking to see if there are any similarities between this Tiercel and Mr. T. Stay tuned!

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=5272637321105%3A59414375

Click on the link above to see my KGallery album of pictures from today’s watch. No sign on needed.

Enjoy!
Carol P.

From Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

I decided to go out for a Falcon Watch even though rain was heading our way. On my way to downtown, I pass Kodak Park, so I checked there first. No luck finding Unity.

When I go downtown, I have a certain route I take to check out all the different areas we are used to seeing Beauty. Kodak Office is my first stop and I didn’t need to go further this time. There she was. Beauty was on the NE corner of what the Watchers call the launch pad, which is above where the old nest box was located. You can still see netting covering the playpen area. The playpen is the level just below the old nest box. It was called the playpen because very often some of the eyases would find their way down there. It was a safe area that allowed them to run and flap their wings under the watchful eye of their parents.

I drove over to the street on the east side of the tower next to the condos that were built over what used to be the Kodak Visitor’s parking lot. This area has changed so much.

It started to rain and I was joined for a short time by Joyce and her dad Herb who was visiting from Florida. It was very nice meeting him. We stood in the rain, until it started to turn to ice pellets. Joyce and her dad had to leave, so I got back into my car to warm up and dry off and continue my Watch.

As I watched, Beauty sprinted across to the SE corner of the launch pad. Have you ever seen a Peregrine run before? Well, it’s pretty hilarious. They may be the fastest creature on the earth, but they were not made for running on those big yellow feet! lol

She picked up a small piece of leftover prey she must have cached there. It didn’t take her long to finish and obviously she was still hungry. She took off and flew around the tower, again landing on the NE corner of the launch pad. I was taking video at this time and watched her walk back out of sight. It wasn’t long before she returned dragging a large wing portion of what looked like it came from a pigeon.

On the NE corner of the launch pad, she started to pluck feathers and eat her fill. She is definitely using the Kodak Tower to cache food and eat her meals.

After finishing her lunch, she settled in to preen, stretch, doze and poop. Ah, the life of a Peregrine Falcon. 🙂

About a 1/2 hour later, she again took off, this time flying around the north side of the tower where I lost sight of her. I drove around to the north and found her on the NW corner of the launch pad. It was time for me to leave.

On the way home, I made one more stop at KP to look for Unity. She was again absent. I had seen her on Christmas Eve, so I knew she was still visiting this area. It was just sometimes hard to find her.

Kathy O, Joyce and her dad joined me for a short while, before we all headed home.

I wanted to share two videos I took of Beauty eating on the Kodak Tower. Sorry for the quality of the video. Just click on these two Youtube links.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGxdVrnlhtY&list=UUkL-m83o7PVaDyTQPEbi-aw&index=2&feature=plcp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGFQd3u-v9M&list=UUkL-m83o7PVaDyTQPEbi-aw&index=1&feature=plcp

Enjoy!
Carol P.

Rochester Falcon Watcher Carol P.

Today I spent time with Beauty and yesterday some time with Unity, so both Rochester Lady Pefas were accounted for this Christmas Weekend.

All was peaceful at both sites, Downtown and Kodak Park. Sunny days with no snow. No white Christmas for Rochester.

I’ve put together a KGallery Album of pics and my report from this weekend and also included a few at the end of the pair of Pergrines we had been seeing at the Irondequoit Mall aka Medley Center.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=7820001221105%3A51858279

Enjoy! No sign on required.

I hope everyone enjoyed this holiday weekend. Merry Christmas!

By Rochester falcon watcher MAK

On another brisk and bright sunny December morning in Rochester CarolP picked me up for a watch. We started downtown and couldn’t find Beauty anywhere so we wandered over to Irondequoit  mall but before we got there we had to stop and take a pic of a Breast cancer pink bulldozer. On one side of it was this caption: Clearing a path for a cure.

Having found no pefas at the mall and surrounding area we headed to KP for a look with yet again no sightings. We had to be getting back downtown for I was going to join Shaky,June,CarolP and Ravi in the Times Square building for some camera maintenance. When we arrived on the Broad St. bridge we spotted a couple Chinook helicopters to the south and then the Beautyful one on the northeast corner of the Crossroads building eating.

It was time to go up to the nest box as the others had arrived. We went most of the way in an elevator and then we had to climb 2 flights of spiral stairs.

My knee held up very well.  I got to see and touch the nest box where Beauty and Archer brought up Callidora(Helga Jean for Janet) and sweet boy Jemison! And here’s my first view of it from down in the well.

Looking up from the well

On the floor of the well were a couple  leftover tidbits from one of Beautys’ meals.

Ravi was fixing the main cam while CarolP stood on the ladder to assist him. Shaky,June and I stood in the well as Carol said Beauty was on Mercury.

She didn’t stay long and Ravi finished up and when Carol got down off the ladder she asked me if I wanted to go up there. Was she kidding… of course I did and so up I went! What a view from up there…

And so I touched the nestbox in 3 spots before climbing down off the ladder feeling very good about my experience. This watch was over and before we departed Carol took a pic of me standing below the nest box smiling! 🙂

By Rochester falcon watcher MAK

It was a long week waiting to get out on a falcon watch and thanks to CarolP  for picking me up and making it possible for me to do so. We headed straight for downtown and the Beautyful one.  We found Beauty on the top ibeam of the OCSR building north side.

Naturally she had her back to us  from where we were parked beside the Radisson Hotel. As we were chit chatting and not paying attention Beauty flew off, in what direction we didn’t know so we went to the Broad St. bridge. She was spotted up on the Times Square building under the northeast wing, one of her favorite places to perch.

Again with her back to us! Brian met up with us at this point and we all went down to Aqueduct St. for a better view and to get away from the tons of people that were out and about for an event at the Blue Cross Arena.

Like a flash Beauty flew off flying east very fast like a girl on a mission until she could no longer be seen. Carol decided we would check the Hawkeye nest site where Joyce  and I had seen her last Saturday. We had no luck in finding her and so the watch took us to the Irondequoit mall to look for the pair there. When we arrived Dana was in the parking lot and so we parked by her to talk. She hadn’t seen either one but I did spot a man with an interesting hat on his head. He was working one of the Salvation Armys red kettles. After taking a pic and zooming to see what was on his head I said “I want one”! You see I’ve always been into peace signs and such.

On a very brisk but sunny day in Rochester we left for Kodak Park. We found Unity where Carol had left her this morning before she picked me up, in the nook on the blue building above the scrape.

After a half hour or so she flew down to the ibeam in front of the scrape for some preening duties.

We left this big gorgeous falcon in the bright sunshine and headed back to the city for one more look to see if we could find Beauty before taking Brian home. No such luck but we were satisfied knowing that both of our resident female falcons were accounted for on this day in December. I was very happy to have spent time with my fellow falcon watchers and of course my feathered friends as well for they all keep me smiling! 🙂

By Rochester falcon watcher MAK

Joyce came to get me this morning and asked me to drive as she was sick and didn’t want to. We checked KP first so the dogs could have a run but Unity was no where to be seen. CarolP,Dana and Dawn were at the Irondequoit mall with the pair of falcons that hang out there so I decided we’d head over there. When we arrived Dawn had left and the female pefa was on an antenna.

She soon flew over to the glass peak in the middle of the mall.

I noticed a large dark bird flying from the east and at first I thought it was a large crow until it got above the female pefa on the glass peak and we all yelled BALD EAGLE!

Click pic for full version

It was magnificent and he soared right above us too! Most of my pics were blurry but I think it’s cuz I was so excited that I couldn’t keep from shaking. My video is a little jumpy too for the same reason. A few minutes later Dana,Carol and Joyce spotted 2 juvie Bald Eagles off to the northwest for a short time. I missed them for some reason. After awhileI told Carol and Dana we were going to check around the other side for the male pefa and as we drove along the east end of the mall Joyce spotted him.

This pair of falcons are gorgeous! A funny coincidence happened where we were all discussing whether pefas mated at this time of year to bond. Well didn’t that male fly over to the female quickly mount her and leave with her following him to the east and out of sight! Joyce and I missed it because of where we were parked but Carol and Dana witnessed it!  We are learning so much from our feathered friends aren’t we? Who knew? Larry and Cleo came by shortly after the show, too late to even see the falcons. When the pair didn’t return right away I decided we’d go look for the Beautyful one downtown. Joyce thought we should check the Irondequoit Bay bridge since that’s the direction they headed but we didn’t find them over there. On our way through Durand Eastman Park Joyce spotted a big Red-tailed Hawk in a tree.

After we left there we checked the Summerville and Charlotte piers for the Snowy Owl without success and then I headed down St. Paul Boulevard toward the city. As we were approaching the Hawkeye division of Kodak I spotted a large bird on the railing of a round metal structure on the roof.

I knew this was a falcon and as Joyce walked up the street to get a closer look I stayed in the car and inspected the pic I had just taken of it’s back. The tail surely looked familiar to me. Could this be Beauty I asked myself? Have I stumbled upon one of her hiding spots? Joyce came back to the car and we went to a parking lot where we could get a front view of this mystery falcon. I knew there was a nest box at this site but I’d never seen it until today. It was right above and in front of this pefa.I didn’t even realize it was a nest box when I was on the backside of it.

After seeing the front of the bird I was fairly certain that this was in fact Beauty. CarolP and I had seen her a couple weeks ago flying from near this location to downtown when we were looking for another nest box on a school off of St.Paul Street. Joyce and I checked downtown and then went back to Hawkeye but she had left by the time we returned so we scooted over to KP to look for Unity. With no sign of her we ended our watch and called it a day! For more pics and a video of the Bald Eagle check out the links below and as always keep smiling!  🙂

http://youtu.be/Sd6qOyZHYGY

Falcon watch with some friends