The Serious Business of Incubation & a Tour of the Falcon’s Canyon

As expected Astrid had taken the night shift in the box. It was a cold and windy night and she appeared to remain tight on the eggs the whole time. Ares came by with a Woodcock at 5:50 AM, but she didn’t seem interested and left the box without taking it. About 15 minutes later she was seen having a drink of water on the roof of the hotel. The pair shared incubation duties fairly evenly for much of the day, although it seemed that Ares drew more time during the afternoon when the sun was flooding the inside of the box. Only a single mating attempt was seen today and no food transfers were witnessed. Astrid did have a good sized crop in the late morning, so we believe that she did eat something. There were also the remains of a woodcock on the sidewalk below the nest box ledge, so that’s another indication of recent feeding. At one point in the afternoon the pair left the eggs for nearly 10 minutes, which is risky on such a cold day, but at that time the sun was exerting its full force in the box and so in our opinion, the eggs should be fine. Ares was seen zipping around the canyon at full tilt in the mid-afternoon. The winds were right for it, so why not. It looked like he went on a hunting foray to the south a little while after that. Despite the cold and wind we had an excellent turnout for our Downtown falcon watching event this morning. Participants got to learn all about our falcons’ habitat and see Astrid and Ares’ favorite hangouts. We even checked out the original nest site used by Maya and Tor back in 2008 & 2009.  Our falcons weren’t very active during our walk, but there were other birds of interest flying by the canyon including an adult Bald Eagle. Thanks to all that attended and hopefully we’ll see you in June during Fledgewatch if not before. We are expecting Astrid to lay a fourth egg sometime tomorrow morning. Stay tuned!