Update on Rogue from MEC
September 18, 2013 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
Tracy Simpson Reports:
This is an important update on Rogue, the MEC resident female that was injured in 2012 on May 21st and has been in rehab up to this point. She was injured in battle with Cass, the resident female at MEC during this nesting season who was sadly found deceased on July 16th across from the nest building.
Since the loss of Cass, our volunteers and I have been watching the MEC site closely as Ashley, the remaining juvenile from this season, was still very dependant on her parents for care and protection. On August 7th, everything changed.
We have recently just found out that The Owl Foundation and Anne Yagi from the OMNR released Rogue, the 2012 resident female, back on August 1st in the Niagara Area. This would explain a great deal with regards to the discovery of a new adult female in the MEC territory by August 7th at the latest at which time I was able to photograph her and her curious identification feature.
The single silver band placed on her left leg instead of the right
definitely ruled out the possibility that The Masters female had moved
over into this void territory as her silver band is on her right leg.
As I sit back and consider all that I witnessed on August 7th and the
weeks that followed, many factors point to Rogue as a strong candidate
as the new MEC female.
1. An adult showing up out of the blue prior to the start of migration where a void just happened to exist. At this point the male was laying low and not advertising his presence or availability due to having a dependant juvenile still on site.
2. An adult banded with a silver band only and consequently on the
wrong leg it is supposed to be applied. A common configuration in the
Niagara district where peregrines are banded and may be indicative of
that locale as her banding site.
3. Child like behaviour from the female. Its like she’s a kid again or
just won the lottery. I would expect an adult female that has been held
captive for so long to have mentally given up and to be home and free
would bring out this behaviour. The mundane things in the territory
have now become novel and to find her mate still available, her box
still there, her previous challenger gone and now coupled with her
freedom would definitely bring out this kind of response.
4. Sitting in the EXACT same perch spots that Rogue used so often.
5. Almost instant familiarity with the territory.
6. Almost instant acceptance by the resident male.
7. This female currently on site is a larger than average female which
is consistent with Rogue. While all of these things don’t specifically
ID this bird it collectively points us in the right direction towards
an ID. Leading up to this discovery, no adult females were present in
the entire Hwy 10 corridor that displayed this band configuration. Due
to the changes in Brampton and renewed activity at Mississauga North
this corridor was being heavily monitored from Dundas in the south up
to Main Street in North Brampton and this bird was in no way present in
the corridor prior to her discovery on August 7th. Of note, the
remaining juvenile female at MEC from this season’s production was
regularly being seen up to the arrival of this new female. She was
behind in her training for independance as the result of the loss of
her only sibling followed by the loss of the resident female. Losing
her sibling created a situation in which her experiential growth slowed
dramatically due to lack of competition and not having another juvenile
to challenge her made her more complacent than active. Losing the care
of the resident female, who was found dead on July 16th, now put
pressure on the male to complete all of her training, defend the
territory, feed her and himself. Once again her training was slowed by
this event and therefore by the time this new female arrived on site on
August 7, the juvenile was not ready for independence at that time. She
has not been seen since and the fate of this young peregrine is unknown.
We will keep you updated on the events at the MEC nest site as they continue to unfold but we strongly believe that the female now holding the MEC territory is in fact Rogue.