!!! Baby H is learning very quickly and starting to look at the world very differently!
July 14, 2011 - Toronto - Don Mills
Mark Nash Reports:
July 14th - 2011 PM watch report.
Once again today, the watchers had many updates of the days activities with Murray and Debbie starting out the day this morning around 7:30am while on their way to work, and Murray continued to do spot checks throughout the day right up to 9pm. Caroline was out around the mid day and Bruce shortly after 2:30pm until after 7pm.
Marion and I joined Bruce and closed the watch around 9:15pm with Murray and Debbie and Caroline.
Baby H made many strong flights today and is well ahead of others fledglings at this age!! With just under a week out of the nest ledge, she is doing incredibly well and was back to the nest ledge today for he first time.
While she has long since gained much higher altitudes than the nest ledge level earlier in the week, this is the first time that we have seen her actually back on the nest ledge (the very one with the nest tray) since her departure. It is at this time in the watch that we usually tone down the intense monitoring and street watch, as this action of returning to the actual “nest ledge itself” is a huge mental boost of confidence builder for the fledglings.
At this time in her development, one of the only things that the fledglings lack, is the confidence, as she is more than capable in holding her altitude and able to escape any perceived dangers. She can actually fly now like an adult big bird 
Today, Baby H made some soft hits and bumps to the windows and concrete walls of the building, which is exactly what we were hoping for! At this stage of her flights, she is still slow and cumbersome, and these hits are usually soft,,(which they were),, and these minor collisions are “leaning experiences” , ones that will not be repeated in the future.
The young fledglings do in fact “learn” through these minor bumps and grinds with windows and concrete walls at these early stages of their flights,, and avoid them in the future. It is our hope during the fledge watches is that the young fledglings have these bumps early in the first flights while they are still slow and cumbersome, and these bumps are usually nothing more than learning experiences that rarely result in serious injuries. Several weeks out of the nest, and the fledglings get over confident and are now building up a great deal of speed in their flights, and their recklessness usually results in far more serious injuries (and even mortality) if they start hitting windows and concrete walls. You know what they say,, “Speed Kills”,, and for a young fledgling peregrine, this holds very true when you start hitting solid objects!
This evening, we watched Baby H take a run at a Starling that passed by below her while she was roosting on the east side of the upper ledges of the nest building, and although she never came close to actually catching it, she did make the attempt to chase it. The Starling flew into the cover of the trees to the north of the nest building and Baby H quickly veered away from the thick branches and tree cover. She has also learned that these areas are not good places for peregrines! Her landings are almost adult like now, no longer hap-hazzard “do drop ins” and it appears that she’s got it!!
This evening, both Quest and Kendal were absent at bed time when darkness fell, and Baby H was noticeably stressed. She made several flights around over the three buildings unable to locate her parents. She finally landed on the upper south face of the nest building and was more than restless as she was very unsettled and noticeably stressed as she scanned the air and buildings to locate her parents. She stood up and layed down more than a dozen times frantically looking around for her parents before she finally layed down. She tucked herself in tight to the building wall, but was still very alert while looking around with her neck and head scratched out trying to get a sight line on her parents. We left just as darkness fell also feeling a little stressed that neither of the adults were anywhere to be seen in any of their usual roosting or hiding spots, and that they had been absent from any of our views for more than 40 minutes.
This was baby H’s first real night alone! Another lesson!
Stay tuned……