Day # 32 of incubation was a cold one in the falcon’s Downtown Canyon. Temperatures were in the low 30s in the early morning and barely reached 40 degrees in the afternoon. There were even a few snow showers and strong wind gusts. Understandably Astrid stayed very tight to the eggs through most of the morning. She adjusted them often and gradually moved the entire clutch all the way to the back northwest corner of the box. We presume because it was warmer there? Ares first showed up at 5:27 AM, but she sent him away. He showed up again at 5:55 and she threw him out again. With no switches taking place, we had no way of knowing if any of the eggs had pips in them. At 8:36 she gave an alarm call, which launched Ares into action. No intruder was seen, but it is conceivable that there was one. At 10:41 AM, Ares came back to the box and Astrid finally let him take over incubating. It was during this changeover that Deb saw that egg # 1 (the egg that was laid on April 1st) had a large pip in it. It was even a big enough hole to see the chick moving around inside. By 11:25, lots of calling was being heard from the chick in the breached egg. A little later when Ares was adjusting the eggs, it looked like egg # 2 might also be pipped, but this was a much smaller hole. By 12:30 Astrid was back on the eggs. Ares came back with food at 2:48 PM. Astrid took the food and left the box, but was back within 5 minutes to relieve Ares again. It really seemed like she wanted to stay with her clutch today. At 5:35 Ares was seen feeding on the hotel ledge. It wasn’t clear what the prey was, but he never brought any of it to the box. We assume that he stored it instead. A switch at 6:00 gave us another look at the eggs and we could see that the hole in egg # 1 was larger, but we still had no hatchling in the nest. At 6:35 Astrid came to the box to relieve Ares. He didn’t want to leave and so she gave him her light chatter call. He still didn’t leave, and so she flew out instead. She came back at 7:15 PM and this time they switched. He returned 15 minutes later with a hunk of food. Maybe it was intended for the chick(s)? She sent him away with it. We end today’s report with 4 eggs still in the nest. Maybe one will hatch tonight? If not, we expect tomorrow morning will give us one if not 2 hatches. We shall see
