There likely will be no "Hell Week" this year in downtown Salt Lake City. And Cat Kivett is not happy about it.
Kivett is part of the Peregrine Watchpost Team, which spends several weeks every summer waiting for peregrine falcon chicks born in nest boxes on the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, and occasionally other downtown buildings, to attempt their first flights.
However, renovation work on the Smith building, and the general scope of the huge City Creek project downtown has apparently chased the peregrines away -- at least for this year.
"I am disappointed, very disappointed," Kivett said. "It is a lot of fun watching them learn to fly and to hunt. People touring Temple Square see us with binoculars and ask what is going on. It is cool to share that with people."
Volunteers have long dubbed the chicks' learning period as Hell Week, because of the frequent crashes and ensuing chaos that results in trying to protect the young falcons as they learn to take wing.
The chance that a peregrine pair have built a nest unbeknownst to observers -- or will create one -- still exists, but the nest-laying time is now.
"April is prime time for egg deposition," said Bob Walters, Watchable Wildlife Coordinator for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. "We are still looking, but it seems like we won't see any peregrine falcons chicks this year."
A nest box on the Joseph Smith Memorial Building that has housed a pair of falcons the past three summers -- and was wired with audio and video for a popular web cam -- was boarded up earlier this year so work can be done on the historic building.
"The work started in mid-April and will end sometime around mid-July," said Richard Sawatzki, facillty manager of the Joesph Smith Building. "If the falcons had been trying to nest it likely would have been disruptive and may have caused them to abandon the eggs or chicks."
In an effort to provide another option, officials from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, set up another nest box -- also wired for the Web -- on the nearby Church Office Building. The nest box has been moved around on the Joseph Smith Memorial Building in the past with some success, but no raptors have shown interest in the new digs.
The pair of falcons that have spent the past three years in the boarded up nest box could have set up shop in a nearby canyon.
"My concern is that they have relocated into a wild area and they will be susceptible to predators of the animal and human variety," Kivett said. "People have been known to take fledglings for the black market."
Kivett has been a part of the Peregrine Watchpost Team for the past four years and she isn't ready to give up on the birds, even if it means her summer evenings will be spent with eyes to the skies. She plans on continuing the search downtown and in the canyons.
"If we can find their aerie in the wild that is where I will be," she said. "I won't be able to be much help to them, but I'm kind of addicted to them."
Sawatzki said there is more work planned on the Joseph Smith Memorial building in the future that may also lead to the closing of the nest box that has been used the past few years.
"We may have the same issue again. If we do, we can use the box being used this year," he said. "We enjoy the falcons and want to do what we can to keep them around, but we need to maintain the building."
