Zara is improving nicely. The soft tissue injury to her right shoulder is healing and she’s looking much better, eating well and fattening up. Zara also received her first West Nile vaccine. She’s VERY feisty, according to June Summers, President, Genesee Valley Audubon. June was able to share a couple pictures of Zara in her flight cage. She’s flying well and gaining height.

Now for some very good news! We are happy to report that Zara has started the next stage of her journey.

On Friday, August 19th, the DEC transferred Zara to a facility that can teach her to catch food in flight. She will be released as soon as she can do that.

We want to thank Gary Zimmerman from Black Creek Wildlife Station for all his hard work in caring for Zara. Over the years, we have brought many of our falcons to him, including Mariah and a few of our young ones. Please consider donating to the Black Creek Wildlife Station.

Black Creek Wildlife Station, Inc.

169 Burnt Mill Rd.

Churchville, NY. 14428

Here are a few more Zara pictures shared by our watchers.

June Summers, President, Genesee Valley Audubon Society, visited Zara today. She’s been in a smaller cage resting, due to her soft tissue injury and she’s put on weight.

Zara will get vaccinated tomorrow against West Nile. Then, depending on how she looks, she will be moved into a larger cage.

It’s so wonderful to see her doing well.

June visited Zara to see how she was progressing. She took this picture of her in the rehabbers flight cage.

There was a little worry, because she was holding her right wing slightly lower than her left wing. Zara can fly, but she isn’t getting a lot of height yet,

Zara got an X-Ray yesterday and we received very good news. There are no broken bones! She has some soft tissue damage, which should heal with time.

Zara continues to improve and she has a good appetite.

We’ll continue to post updates as we receive them.

There are many abbreviations the watchers use when posting tweets and reports. It can be confusing. So here is a list of those off the top of my head. I’m sure I’ll miss some and they will not be in alphabetical order, at least for now. We can work on a better list for reference purposes. Ok, here goes! Let’s start at home.

TSB = Times Square Bldg, home of the Rochester Falcons nest box. Topped by the “Wings of Progress”. First known as Genesee Valley Trust building.

OCSR = Old Changing Scenes Restaurant, the tall building with the disk on top. It used to be a revolving restaurant a long time ago. I was told not to set my purse on the window ledge, you might not see it again! Official name: First Federal Plaza Building

TR = Officially called the Aqueduct Building, but Thompson Reuters occupied it most recently. Home of the Mercury Statue. We have been calling it TR, but it should probably be AB for Aqueduct Bldg.

BCA= Blue Cross Arena aka Rochester War Memorial, home of the Rochester Amerks. Go Amerks!

KO = Kodak Office or KT = Kodak Tower

FCT = Frontier Communication Tower

JCT = Jail Communication Tower

WW = Widows Walk aka Old City Hall Building. Most recently called Irving Place.

Bridges

ASB = Andrews St Bridge.

BSB = Broad St Bridge, the city wants to close this bridge to traffic, making it a pedestrian only bridge.

CSB = Court St Bridge.

Directions

N, S, E, W = North, South, East, West and all the combinations, ie NE = Northeast, SW = Southwest, etc.

We may call some of the downtown buildings by their old names. Here are some that have new names.

Xerox Tower now called Innovation Square.

Midtown Plaza now called Tower 280.

Bausch & Lomb now called Legacy Tower.

The Chase Tower (the Lincoln First Tower before that) now called The Metropolitan.

I’m sure there are more. Post any others you would like to know in the comments.

ETA: Also check out the Glossary Page on the Forum.

June Summers, President, GVAS, spoke to the rehabber this afternoon about how Zara is doing. She’s doing really good!

Zara is eating well and putting on a little weight. She’s in a flight cage where she has plenty of room to fly. She has no broken bones!

This is wonderful news!

June Summers, President, Genesee Valley Audubon (GVAS), received a call from the owner of the Wilder Bldg last night. They don’t go down to the basement frequently, but a member of the staff had to go down there and was startled by a large bird. June and the owner went down to the basement and found a juvenile Peregrine Falcon with a red band! Zara was quite feisty, but they were able to capture her.

June immediately took her to a local rehabber. Zara is thin, but seems to be in good shape. She was fed and will see a Veterinarian today.

You can imagine our total surprise! Zara had been missing for nearly 2 weeks. The Rochester Falcon Watchers now believe in miracles!

We’ll post updates as we receive them.

Zara was last seen by the evening fledge watchers either landing on or flying near the Wilder Bldg on Friday evening. She has not been seen since.

Today we contacted the owner of the Wilder Bldg and were given permission to check the building. Zara was not seen in or on the building or on the surrounding buildings.

We will continue to search for her.

We didn’t have to wait long for Blaze to fledge. At 9:23 am, under the watchful eyes of his falcon watchers, he took off from the wall. He headed towards the Wilder Bldg, landing safely on top of the building. Kanfai Malachim was nearby and quickly joined him. It was so much fun watching them reacquaint themselves.

They remained together most of the morning and afternoon until Nova brought in food and the chase was on!

Sadly, Zara has not been seen since last night. She was last seen on the Wilder Bldg by the evening watchers.

The morning watchers searched for her but were not able to find her.

Hopefully she will show herself soon.

We knew it would happen soon, but we’re never quite ready to see them leave the nest box.

Both Kanfai Malachim and Zara fledged successfully this afternoon.

Kanfai Malachim was first. She fledged at 1:38 pm flying off the wall and landing on the Union Trust Bldg. She soon took off again at 2:21 pm and flew up to the top of the Wilder Bldg. A third flight took her to the top of the Cross Rds Bldg where she cried for food from Neander who was nearby on a lower ledge. She flew a 4th time, chasing Neander past the Times Square Bldg. She was seen turning back towards the Wilder Bldg. She has not been seen since then, but she’s probably exhausted after all that flying and hunkered down somewhere out of sight. The watchers that witnessed her flights, said she was doing great, flying strong and gaining altitude.

Zara was our 2nd fledge at 4:35 pm. She took off heading north, landing on the corner of the Wilder chimney. She flapped and flapped and finally found her balance, nailing her landing. The watchers gave her a 10! Her 2nd flight took her to the Telesca Bldg.

Blaze is still home, enjoying a meal that he got to eat all by himself under the watchful eye of mom, Nova. This was the first time he didn’t have to fight his sisters for a bite of food. It looks like he’ll be spending the night by himself.

Many thanks to all the Rochester Falcon Watchers that have been downtown watching the young falcons take their first flights! And to those controlling the Rfalconcam cameras to track the movements of our two girls, who we can now call juvies. Awesome Teamwork!

We spoke with a DEC biologist after the banding. A preliminary report ruled out avian flu. The cause of death was related to egg laying, but Beauty was not egg bound.

If we learn anything else, we’ll report it.