The Canadian Peregrine Foundation

Hamilton

Daily Updates - Jan. - Mar., 1998

January, 1998
Kenn Chapman reports: Three confirmed sitings of either or both adults were made during the month of January. I've lost a printout of the e-mail specifying the details, but I have a copy of it somewhere on my hard drive and will update this note as soon as I find it.

Tuesday, February 24
Kenn Chapman reports: New video equipment was installed by Intercon Security on Friday at the downtown Toronto site. Today, they are installing the same high-tech video system at the Etobicoke site. The Hamilton installation will be done hopefully before the end of the week.

Thursday, February 26
Nadine Litwin reports: Apparently there were no falcons around when the Sheraton rooftop was cleaned up. But earlier this afternoon someone in the Stelco Tower saw a falcon swoop up to one of the corner perches of the Tower. Now *that's* something one of our birds would do. I *am* wondering if maybe there might be another peregrine in Hamilton, not one of the original pair, *another* bird. No one has actually described the peregrine(s) (i.e. first, second year bird, or full adult; there's an assumption that it's a female, but is it??).

Monday, March 2
Brian Henley reports: I am seeing the female Peregrine every day recently...she's been putting herself on the northwest cotner of The El Duque apartment building. That is the tallest building of the many apartment blocks in the area, and, as Brian noted, she has a direct visual line from that spot to the Sheraton site.
-- Even early today, in all the cold and rain, she was sitting there. Is she making herself visible for any passing males ?
-- I have yet to see any other Peregrines but her...in February, I saw a female Peregrine down at the Bayfront Park, perched on top of one of the relatively small trees there, and she let me get very close before flying off...I am reasonably sure it was our lady.

Wednesday, March 4
Kenn Chapman reports: Today the new video camer was installed on the nest ledge by Intercon Security. The camera controls and image were checked out and every thing is working just fine.
-- Brian Burgon reports that just after the work was finished, both adults showed up on the nest ledge together and remained there for some time. This is the first time both adults have been seen together since last fall. I'm sure they spent some time chatting about family planning strategies.

Nadine Litwin reports: About 3:00pm Bruce and I went back up to look again. And there they were: two peregrines, a male and female, flying together. They were doing courtship flying, it was spectacular, they went to all the old spots including the very top of the Stelco Tower, the Ellen Fairclough roof and of course, the Sheraton. When they came swooping over our heads we decided to gather up the last of our things and leave the space to them. As we left the rooftop, Bruce saw the male peregrine land on the edge of the nest ledge.
-- From the street level I saw the female sitting on the nest ledge and the male doing swooping flybys, and I could hear the chittering. We heard them chittering when we were on the roof, but I didn't expect to hear it from the street, so that was really cool!
-- I went back to take a last look between 4:30 and 5:00pm. I saw one peregrine flying high due west. About ten minutes later a peregrine came in from the west, flying low, and headed straight for the Ellen Fairclough rooftop. We have a peregrine pair back in Hamilton!!!

Thursday, March 5
Nadine Litwin reports: Confusion reigns! At about 11:30 this morning I stopped off in downtown Hamilton to look for our favourite birds, and saw both of them .... she was sitting on the nest ledge, and he was perched two ledges away. He is a full adult. But SHE is a very, very brown bird across the back, and buff with streaks on the front. This is *not* a full adult female. So who is she??? And who is the male??? We have an alert going out in Hamilton for observers to look for a full adult female bird, and to see if anyone can get a read of this young female's black colour band.
-- CPF invited the Hamilton Spectator to have a look at the monitor that's set up in its temporary home. While we admired the view of the empty nest site, and were impressed with the quality of the image, BOTH PEREGRINES appeared on the nest ledge! We couldn't tell if the opening-and-closing beaks were vocalizations or what. The male left (or at least moved off the ledge out of view of the camera), but the female stayed. She jumped down into the nest and poked around at the far end. It looked like she was picking up things and putting them down again. Our reporter and photographer got more than any of us expected during that interview! I can't wait to see the pictures!
-- I heard from Brian Burgon that at about 4:00pm, he had both birds in full view, perched on the Ellen Fairclough roof. We're all scrambling to get some 'scopes set up in a couple of key places so we can try id'ing these birds.

Friday, March 6
Brian Burgon reports: -- At 2:20 p.m. we saw three birds at the nest site. Adult male was feeding under the Sheraton sign. We could see one other bird - large - in the far end of the nest scrape with its wings extended obviously agitated. The male swooped past the nest ledge several times after flying from the Standard Life to the Stelco Tower and back. Then we saw one large bird hop out of the scrape and fly off, followed by another large bird. They were obviously fighting in the far end of the scrape. All three moved out of sight over HBOE building.
-- This possibly explains the presence of an immature female noted by Nadine on Mar 5.
-- Adult male was on Fairclough building earlier today.
-- At about 3:00 p.m. observers saw adult female - based on size and whiteness of breast on the ledge. She flew off and shortly thereafter, the adult male returned.
-- Len reports that at 4 PM Friday there were two falcons at the nest site. Considering their activities it was a safe bet that one was male and one was female! He also received a report that early this afternoon a number of Board staff observed three falcons together in the area. Lots of vocalising.

Saturday, 7 Mar 1998
Kenn Chapman reports: Nadine stopped off in downtown Hamilton at about 2:00pm to look for the peregrines. And today she can say absolutely for sure that "mom" and "dad" are back home. She didn't see the young female.

Monday, 9 Mar 1998
Kenn Chapman reports: Observers in the Stelco Tower sighted three birds through the gloom this morning. One of the people saw a large bird on the SW corner of the Stelco Tower - silver band on left leg; red band on right leg. Brian Burgon reports two birds around 4:00pm.

Tuesday, 10 Mar 1998
Kenn Chapman reports: Brian Burgon reports two birds flying overhead as he crossed King Street at 7:30 this morning. Calling cak-cak-cak drowning out all traffic noise.

Sunday, March 29
Kenn Chapman reports: On a birding trip to Hamilton today, I watched for an hour around noon. I saw the female come and go to the nest ledge a few times, only to fly off to other buildings or just around for the outing.
-- Around 4, now joined by Nadine and Mark Nash, we watched a mating on a lower corner ledge of the Stelco building. It lasted about 6-7 seconds, and they were very noisy about it.
-- About 4:30, a turkey vulture made a grave error by wandering into the area close to the Sheraton Hotel. Dad quickly went on the offensive and took several dives at it. After about five minutes, the turkey vulture got the message and chose to move on to friendlier skies.
-- About 15 minutes after that, we saw a large group of turkey vultures, perhaps 65 in all, drifting slowly towards the west, far south of our location.

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