Utica Peregrine Falcons Update for Wednesday, March 1st, 2023
It was another chilly night with temperatures down around 25° F. During the course of the day it warmed up to about 35°. Some rain and snow came in the afternoon. Ares first arrived at the nestbox at 5:50 AM. Five minutes later, Astrid buzzed by him and landed on the ledge close to the nest, but somewhere out of our view. We think she was on a ledge below the box which is highly unusual. The falcons loudly conversed with each other for a while and that culminated with Astrid flying up to the crossperch. At 6:30, before daybreak, the pair performed their first dance of the day. He left two minutes later. At 6:48. We think Ares brought Astrid a gift but we’re not positive about that. Ten minutes later, he hopped into the box from the west veranda just as she landed on the crossperch. From there she darted over to the steeple. At 7:39 Astrid moved again – this time to an east window ledge. Ares returned to the box and to the crossperch at 7:56. At 8:05 the falcons had their second ledge display of the morning. She was standing over Ares’ super scrape for most of the dance. After he departed she made a scrape inside his mega scrape. This was interesting since the last time Ares had a super scrape, Astrid didn’t like it so much and preferred to scratch out her own normal-sized scrape on the opposite side of the box. At 9:39 PM Astrid was out on the crossperch and Ares was inside the box working on his crater project. There may have been a failed mating attempt at 11 o’clock. At 11:07 Astrid flew over to the west face of the State Building. Ares started giving long calls at the box. At 11:52 Ares came back to the nest with prey. Astrid immediately flew over and took it from him.
At 12:10 PM. Astrid returned to the canyon after finishing her complimentary meal. When she flew in she zipped around the corner of the bank building, dashed by the box, and landed on the east veranda. Ares became very excited. He responded, predictably, by hopping into the box and giving squeaking calls. At 12:17 the pair mated on the east veranda, but it was very short and probably could not be considered a successful attempt. At 12:20 Astrid flew over to the west office perch (Deb’s Perch). She stayed there for a few minutes before flying off to some unseen place. Ares also was out of view until 2:30 when he showed up on an east window ledge. At 4:00 Astrid was on the east veranda and Ares was out of view again. Eighteen minutes later Ares brought food to the box and Astrid took it from him on the east veranda. She flew away with it but we couldn’t track where she went. At 4:50 Astrid was back from her undisclosed location and perching on the west veranda. At 5:10 Ares was at the box on the crossperch and Astrid was hazing the 15th floor of the Bank building. At one point she landed at the box near Ares, but she stumbled and fell through the gap between the crossperch and the box! We couldn’t see how far she dropped before she was able to deploy her wings. Regardless, she recovered quickly and did a couple of close passes by the 15th floor before landing on the crossperch. She then started bowing and apparently asking to mate, but it was atypical how she was asking. She was fanning out her tail feathers and drooping her wings. It looked more like mantling. Indeed, this is how she acts when she tries to hide her Pigeon from Ares – except for the fact she had no food. As it happened Ares wasn’t interested in mating and he flew off – probably to his night perch. Astrid remained at the box until a few minutes before 6:00 PM. Goodnight all.