New Female Identified as Chessie from Buffalo at William Osler
April 13, 2012 - Etobicoke - William Osler
Tracy Simpson Reports:
Well, back to the site this morning to see whether my eyes were deceiving me. Nope. She’s still there. As I was pulling in, the female was sitting in the tower and Hurricane flew over to mate. He then took off over to the nest ledge and ran directly into the tray echupping the whole way. Hurricane was doing a great job of showing this new girl where everything was and where the eggs were supposed to go. He took off and flew back over to the eastern tower and the female decided to go to the nest tray and see what Hurricane had done in there. I was able to capture a few shots of her before she took off and you can really see her youth in her colouration. She also has a very distinct circle of white around the top of her head almost as if her halo had slipped. Within minutes of entering the tray, she took off on a mission to the east and was gone for about 10 minutes. Her return was announced very loudly as she screamed and cacked the whole way to the ledge carrying a pigeon. She landed on the nest ledge just beside the tray and started to eat. She eat very vigorously as not just feathers, but chunks of feathers were being removed. After eating for a few minutes, off she went with the food to the southern “H” sign where she stashed the remainder of the meal. Hurricane remained in the tower and several times begged for a taste but he never moved. He was sitting in O’Connors old spot which was front and center of the eastern tower and was focussed on keeping his eye on things. The female came over and joined him, landing a few sections back from the face of the tower. It was there that I finally got a look and a picture of her band number and she was identified by her Black 49 over Green AD recovery band as Chessie from the Central Terminal nest site in Buffalo, New York. Chessie is the daughter of Stash and Stella, an unbanded pair of peregrines that established the CT nest site and raised chicks there in 2010 and 2011. She was named by the Central Terminal staff in honour of the Chessie railroad system which had lines all over the eastern US. In a bizarre twist of fate, the Central Terminal nest site was taken over this year by a new female, Gleig, who hatched in 2009 at the Hamilton Sheraton Hotel. Let the Great Lakes swap meet continue!!
As I was leaving, both adults were sitting together in the eastern tower digesting the morning meal. It is unknown, given her age, whether Chessie will be attempting motherhood this year but it won’t be for lack of interest. One good thing that Hurricane is helping her with is gently persuading her to use the tray on the eastern side of the hospital where just yesterday she was beak deep in the gravel enlarging the scrape.
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