I hear there a delicacy! 

Go get em! When I was a meat wrapper for Shop Rite, we would get them in for the Holidays.. and I had to wrap them..(2 to a package)! Also Pizzle...OMG!! (look it up). The butcher used to say "Donna catch" and he'd throw me a curve (ball). Naturally, I'd scream.

 A poem about the peregrine falcon

The University of Minnesota Rochester is scheduled to reveal its choice for a mascot on Wednesday during an event in the Peace Plaza at 7 p.m.

I wrote in a column back in June that my choice was the peregrine falcon, which is among the three finalists. The others are the Griffins and the Raptors.

That column prompted this poem by someone who calls him/herself the Anonymous Political Poet:

The peregrine Falcon

A smart searching bird

A hungry predator

Its sharp cry can be heard

 

It's the fastest flying bird

In the whole entire world

Two hundred miles an hour

Its powerful wings unfurled

 

From the tundra to the tropics

It's the most widespread bird of prey

It is loyal; mates for life

Hunts to eat everyday

 

Medium sized birds

Make up most of their diet

But occasionally small mammals, reptiles and even insects;

They will try it


Oh no. It can't be true!

But it is. A Gopher is a small mammal

What does that say to you?

Gopher, watch out for that Falcon       

Swooping from the blue

All right, the University of Minnesota Rochester students have spoken. The school's mascot is now and will forever more be the Raptor. I made my case earlier for the Peregrine Falcon, because it's a fast, fearsome bird that can be found in and around Rochester. 

Of course, a raptor can also be a falcon — or an eagle or any other bird of prey. So, I guess it's OK. The new logo is pretty cool. I don't know about you, but I think it looks like a pumped up Woody Woodpecker on a mission to kick some butt.

I've become a collector of baseball caps with cool logos, on them, so I can't wait to pick up my first Raptors cap. And I can't wait to attend my first Raptors football game — in the year 2025. What good's a mascot (I'd recommend we call him Woody) if he can't go out there and cheer a team on to kick some butt.

They're calling it the Testicle Festival. Planned for Sept. 18 in Zumbrota, it's being organized by a former ranch hand from Wyoming. And it will feature 2,000 pounds of Rocky Mountain Oysters. That's right, bull testicles.

If anyone's interested!  

I stumbled upon him as he stood alone in the middle of Sixth Street, his paralyzing stare fixed on me with a mix of menace and surprise as if to say, "Yeah, I'm here, you got a problem with that?"

The hood and coloring revealed it as the world's swiftest assassin, even before its lethal weapons began clicking quietly upon the asphalt

Was he about to draw? Will he ever blink?

No. But I did. And even when my eyes reset, this young peregrine falcon still stood barely 15 feet away. It was the first of what became a series of interludes with the globe's fastest bird here on the streets and in the skies of downtown Medford.

Like a pair of adults did four years ago, this young falcon apparently had set up shop downtown in hopes of turning the resident urban pigeon population into its own private HomeTown Buffet.

What more could a bird with a taste for dove entrails want? Concrete buildings for perching, the towering oaks of Alba Park for cover and enough aerial rats to pick off nearly at will in the air.

This bird laid claim to his new urban niche virtually undisturbed as Medfordites busied themselves, unaware that this killing creature again buzzed its skies.

"Alba Park is a great hangout for a peregrine," says Dave Clayton, a biologist for the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest. "There's all sorts of things for them to eat.

"It's been quite some time since we've seen one down there, so that's cool," Clayton says.

Cool is a word that comes naturally in conversations about peregrines.

Once ravaged to near extinction from the effects of the chemical DDT, peregrines have roared back throughout the United States and Oregon, particularly in Western Oregon.

They have been harnessed and trained as hunters for more than 1,000 years, with their aerial artistry something out of an R-rated slasher movie.

They typically hover 1,000 feet or so above the ground, then dive at more than 150 mph onto their unsuspecting prey. Just before impact, they spin and place their balled feet forward. The back talons stick out like spikes that rake their prey upon impact, which normally knocks them dead to the ground.

The last time peregrines hunted downtown Medford was 2008, when pigeon heads and entrails were common calling cards around Alba Park and the Medford Hotel.

But that pair's nest was never discovered, and sightings waned. No reports of peregrines in Medford have come to state wildlife biologists until this year.

But peregrines are seemingly everywhere.

Oregon had 113 known nesting pairs last year, ranging from the wildlands between the Table Rocks near Sams Valley to beneath the Fremont Bridge in Portland.

"From a numbers point of view, there are definitely more peregrines throughout the landscape than in the urban areas," says Martin Nugent, the threatened, endangered and sensitive species coordinator for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

At 15 to 17 inches tall with wingspans of 3 feet, males are smaller than females.

The new Medford peregrine seems to be a young bird, about 15 inches tall. Male, maybe, but to verify might mean losing an eye.

Standing that day near the corner of Sixth and Grape streets, we stared at each other for a solid minute. He then flew briefly to perch on a nearby parking sign while traffic dribbled by, with no drivers recognizing their rare privilege.

Over the next few days, the bird regularly perched on power poles, its head on a swivel as he monitored the ever-freaking pigeon population. Crows buzzed him at times, trying to send this apex predator packing for other environs.

Out of the blue last week, the bird soared downward at an unsuspecting bald guy walking up Grape Street toward the U.S. Courthouse. He pulled up 10 feet from impact, then perched on a nearby building as if to snicker at his handiwork.

"Ha. That's interesting," Clayton says. "Sounds like a juvie."

As in juvenile, and perhaps the recent offspring of a peregrine pair known to be nesting in some unidentified site in the Medford area, Clayton says.

"At this time of year, you never know," Clayton says. "It could be passing through. It might be a resident. If so, it's a great spot to spend your first winter."

But just like the Roosevelt elk herd in northeast Medford, this peregrine was never there when I needed him. I had no camera when we stood eye-to-eye in Sixth Street, nor when the bald guy almost got a new part in his scalp.

In the past week, when I had a camera in tow, the peregrine was nowhere to be found.

The aerial assassin may have taken his homicidal stare to new urban digs for the winter.

And, no, I don't have a problem with that.

how tiny?

BC, it was very tiny...maybe Chicadee size but long and thin. It was all brown...light brown but the wings were a bit darker. It had a very unusual call. Could it maybe be a Wren of some sort? IDK!

Don't ya love how we stray from Accident to LBJ's? 

Great work Donna. You'll be up to 8000 by quiet season. 

Jeeze, I hope not!  Thanks.

Thanks Lola, that was nice of you. 7000's right around the corner..

at 6:06, Archer arrives at nest

He waits for the Mrs.
and waits
ho hum
Maybe she's not coming this time
and leaves

Thanks  guys, awww, it was nothin. Boy, they sure do rack up huh? I should be for over-posting. Actually, it wasn't hard at all. I think it was from all them texts from MAK that I posted for her, so I should say "Thanks" MAK for putting me over the edge.

!!! Sad news to report, Nihei from 2009 has died.
August 19, 2010 - Ottawa - Crowne Plaza
CPF Postmaster Reports:

I am sad to report that our Nihei of last season has died. She had been found badly injured in Saint-Germain-de-Grantham, Quebec last September 9th. She was brought to a wildlife clinic with multiple fractures (scapula & coracoid ) and was cared for by a vet there. Unfortunately she contracted a bacterial infection and died. At least she was with caring people when she died.
Eve

Eve Ticknor

!!! Sad news from Mississauga at the Holcim nest site.
August 11, 2010 - Mississauga - St Lawrence Cement
Mark Nash Reports:

We have received some sad news from the Holcim nest site in Mississauga as the news of yet another one of this years juveniles didn’t make it. Sadly, it appears that the little juvenile named Holcim suffered fatal injuries as a result of him coming to the ground. While sad news to report, its also nice to know that his other siblings are all doing quite well and have stayed high and out of trouble. While the urban landscape can offer a very hospitable environment, safe from the usual dangers that exist for a young peregrine in the wild, it can also be a very dangerous environment with unique challenges, and the young of the year still have much to learn.

It is nice to know that while mortality is expected at every nest site, it is much lower at the urban nest site given the human intervention that is provided by the many staff and volunteers at each nest site during the fledge watches that are on hand to offer assistance and rescue some of the birds that take a little longer to hone their flight skills in an effort to stay aloft.

A huge thank you to Armando and the great staff and management team at Holcim for their incredible foster care and stewardship of their nesting peregrines, as this nest site has been a huge success overall year afer year since the peregrines first set up house.

Each year the Holcim nest site has produced and successfully fledged offspring that have survived to adulthood and some of the know survivors are now nesting and producing their own offspring in other parts of the country (both here in Canada and the USA).

Poor babies! 

   Congrats on your 6000th post Donna!  Can't wait to see what Shaky comes up with for under your name this time.   

  is all I gots to say! 

http://www.bukisa.com/articles/65277_weirdest-and-unique-creatures-in-the-avian-world

Wow.....some of these....hello

http://news.discovery.com/animals/migrating-birds-canada-gulf-coast.html

Nearly five million Migratory birds from Canada are now winging their way south across North America, and many of them could be in for a nasty shock when they reach the oily marshes and beaches along the Gulf Coast. 

Oh, Donna!!!!  That just about covers my bird watching experiences!!!!  What I am waiting for is for the bird to have a speaker and say "I am an eagle."  It just might be the only way I can easily identify them!

Me too jeanne...I told MAK a few weeks ago, I saw a tiny little brown bird. I've never seen one before, (what else is new)? So I googled "tiny little brown bird"... and I got hundreds of entries and still none of them were what I saw.    Yeah, so...uh huh.

Donna, you googled it all wrong.  Don't you remember the REAL name of that bird?  Siobhan Ruck told us the official name on the Yahoo board YEARS ago.  It's an LBJ bird...Little brown job... 

Yeah, yeah Ei, I remember but this was a TLBJ, Tiny Little Brown Job. 

What a lovely story Bobbi and well told. Thank ye dear lady. AND, what happened to all your puppies??

Well, two of the littles crossed the Rainbow Bridge fairly quickly... I cried. We got homes for 3 - really good ones! And the other two, we could not bear to part with. They and their mom lived long and happy lives here in Wicklow... mostly under the kitchen table...

Very nice Bobbi, sorry about the 2 that crossed, yes sad. Thank you!