Utica Peregrine Falcons Update for Friday, March 10th, 2023
It was cold overnight. The temperature got down to 20 degrees. There was a gradual warm up during the day. By midafternoon the temperature had reached the high 30s. Astrid arrived on the state office building at 5:08 AM. We noticed that the crows that roost in the area were particularly vocal and were heard the consistently for the better part of two hours. Astrid came to the nest box at 6:14. Shortly after that we saw Ares on a west ledge plucking and then feeding on prey. At 6:41 he brought Astrid what was left and she took it to the hotel. At 8:17 Astrid was on the steeple and Ares was on the hotel plucking a rather large prey item. At 9:27 Ares came to the box. It seemed he decided not to give Astrid his leftovers. He probably stored them. While in the box Ares worked on his mega scrape project. At 9:30 Astrid came to the crossperch. Soon after she was bowing asking to mate. They mated less than five minutes later. At 10:00 o’clock Ares was on the steeple. Minutes later he flew to the box and did some more work on his scrape. At 10:23 the falcons mated on the east veranda. At 11:00 o’clock Astrid was on the steeple and Ares was back in the nest. At 11:30 both falcons were in the box having a ledge display. Ares left about 10 minutes later. Astrid stayed in the box for a long time afterwards.
At 12:45 PM Ares was back to the box and Astrid was out. At 2:08 Astrid was on the crossperch and Ares was calling from inside the box. Moments later they mated. At 2:33 we thought there would be another mating. Although, that time, Ares flew out and didn’t come back. At 3:31 Ares came to the east veranda with some unrecognizable chunk of leftovers. It was the leftovers he had stored earlier. After a ludicrous tug-o-war that lasted for about a minute, he let her take it and off she flew. At 3:47 the pair mated on the east veranda again. At 4:55 Ares was back in the box and Astrid was on the east veranda once again. She was asking to mate. They mated at 4:59. By this time it had begun to snow. Despite the wind and driving snow the falcons seemed dedicated to stay out. At 5:32 Ares was on his pillar perch. Astrid was once again calling and signaling that she wanted to mate. At 5:54 Astrid left the veranda, but she wasn’t going to retire. She went to the west office perch (AKA Deb’s Perch). By this point it was snowing even heavier. It was also very windy. At 6:05 Astrid was up and probably off to her night perch. Ares retired at 6:15. Goodnight Falcons.