Ashley Accidentally Fledges on Friday Night
June 14, 2013 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
Tracy Simpson Reports:
This morning Ashley did it, she hopped the gap. This is a big step towards fledging for the young at MEC and is a precursor to first flights. It was just after 8am when Ashley took the big leap and once the first jump was successful, it was a free for all across the face of the nest building! She went from one gap to another and was doing it with ease and confidence. She stopped briefly to investigate each well for scraps and was fortunate enough to find a cache hidden in one of them. All the while that this was going on, Catherine watched from the porch of the nest box with a touch of jealousy I suspect. She screamed and howled for Ashley to come back and eventually, when Ashley did return to the nest ledge, the greeting they exchanged was quite endearing. For the next hour they felt the need to be in physical contact with one another and were completely inseparable. Ashley continued to jump the gaps and make her way around the face of the nest building and finally made it around to the northeast corner where the adults like to perch and watch the kids. Once there she was buffeted by strong winds and had trouble maintaining her balance. She quickly abandoned the corner and made her way back to her sister at the nest box. The pair settled down for the afternoon and there was a serious nap time. They slept and preened on and off for hours and it seemed as though they were never going to move off of that ledge. Supper arrived around 7pm and both girls were treated to a rather large pigeon. They quickly filled themselves and dropped down into the well, presumably to bed. I started to move my watch location back over towards my car and put some things away as I anticipated they may stay down for the night. Ashley had other plans. She came out of the well and began to ledge hop again which had me a little nervous as the winds were starting to pick up. She hopped down to the northeast corner and then in a flash, she was blown backwards off of the ledge. With her wings in an uncoordinated pinwheel, she dropped straight down for 10 stories before she got both of her wings open and symmetrical. This action grabbed the wind and she went into a glide out and around to the north then back towards the nest building. She continued to lose altitude as she swung out towards the 6 lanes of Hurontario Street and I hit the ground running. I knew it would take me a minute or so to get around to the west side of the nest ledge and so I moved it as fast as I could. As I was trotting up the MEC 1 driveway I suddenly had another runner right beside me. It was Winston! We high tailed it around the day care and heard the robins alarm calling. We began to search and found Ashley sitting pretty as a picture on the retaining wall of a raised garden. I grabbed my towel, grabbed Ashley and then she grabbed me. She was quite a roughie for her tumble down and was looking great. Not a ruffled anything except her pride. We placed her in a rescue carrier in security and gave her an hour and a half to compose herself. I checked her out for any apparent injuries and headed up to the roof for the release while Winston watched from the ground in case she flew again. I took her to a corner on the roof and opened the carrier door. Instead of coming out, she filled it up! I reached inside the door for the edge of towel and little Miss decided that my fingers were fair game to grab with both feet and then bite. Thank the stars she got the towel and not me. She came bolting out and into the corner where she turned and addressed me, almost dared me, to touch her again. We left her there on the roof with her mad face on to try again in the morning and her sister sleeping in the nest box.