Utica Peregrine Falcons Update for Monday, February 27th, 2023
The day began on the chilly side with temperatures close to 20°. By midafternoon the temperature reached 37°, but a stiff wind made it seem colder. The skies were partly clear for the first half of the day, and mostly cloudy in the second half. A winter storm threatened to hit the region in the evening. Ares arrived at the box at 5:38 AM. At 6:10 he excitedly called out and announced that Astrid had landed on the State Building. Twenty minutes later there was a mating attempt on the State Building. We don’t know if it was successful or not. At 7:54 Astrid was on the hotel, possibly with food, but we couldn’t confirm that. Both Falcons were on the State Building only five minutes later. Ares returned to the nest box at 9:30. At 10:20 he was giving long calls and trying to encourage Astrid to come over for a ledge display. At 10:56 Astrid finally came to the box, but by that time Ares had gone. They just weren’t getting their timing tight today. Regardless, Ares came back only five minutes later, and the pair shared a long conversation. She was on the crossperch asking to mate and he was standing on his over-sized scrape requesting a dance. And then, just as Ares was obliging his mate and leaping out of the box, Astrid changed her mind about mating and jumped into the box instead. While inside the box, Astrid made her own scrape on top of Ares’ scrape-tastic creation.
At 11:30 AM Ares brought food to the east veranda. Astrid took it and flew off with it somewhere. We checked around with the PTZ cams but couldn’t locate her. At 12:49 PM Astrid returned to her east ledge perch. Ten minutes later Astrid had flown again and was out of view. At 1:14 Ares was back in the box and calling very excitedly. Astrid had returned to her east ledge but then was up again after only a minute. At 1:28 Ares arrived at the box, followed closely by Astrid to the crossperch. There was an aborted mating attempt at 1:36. He went to his pillar perch right afterwards. At 2:30 Astrid was back on the crossperch and Ares was back in the box. Once more she was asking to mate. They tried five minutes later but it was yet another failed attempt. Perhaps the failures could be blamed on the relentless wind throwing off Ares’ trajectory. At 4:06 PM Astrid was on the crossperch once again and Ares was on his favorite pillar perch. At 4:33 Ares brought a small hunk of prey to the nest. Astrid took it right away and flew off into the canyon with it. At 4:48 Astrid was back and on the west veranda perch. When he moved to the east veranda, she took off again. He was then back to the box at 5:44. Astrid had gong to her night perch well before this and Ares followed suit 15 minutes later. Goodnight falcons.