!!! Merry and Pippin take flight!!!
June 17, 2014 - Kitchener - CTV-Bell Media Tower
Lisa Reh Reports:
June 17 – At 9:00 a.m. Merry flew to the parapet left from the nest box. He started walking along the parapet running horizontal to Union Street towards Park Street. He ended up on the parapet, 2nd from the right facing Park Street. One of the adults was perched on the north corner of the tower.
At approximately 11:15, Merry was engaged in acrobatics with one of the parents and hit the Union Street windows really hard at the 9th floor level! Luckily, Wendy was alerted and called Rudy. While waiting for Rudy, Wendy and I went to the 5th floor roof with Security to look for Merry. Luckily we found him alive and walking around in a corner of the 5th floor. We stayed out of his sight to try and keep him calm and waited for Rudy to arrive to assess the situation. When Rudy arrived, he decided that we should attempt to catch him to make sure he wasn’t injured. Towel in hand, Rudy approached Merry slowly and tried to put the towel over him but he would have none of it. He flew to the next level of the roof and then flew towards Park and Union at about the 5th floor level and then we lost sight of him. We looked over the edges of all the sides of the roof that we could but Merry was nowhere to be seen. Wendy and Rudy then went to the ground to search for Merry, while I went up to the 10th floor to see if I could see him down on the 5th floor levels. I finally spotted him on the corner of King and Union on the 5th floor roof. He was there for the rest of the afternoon, with various members of the team checking up on him. He took little walks back and forth along the King Street side and would sometimes disappear from sight. At one point, he was trying to fly up towards the nest box and there was much squawking going on. He was still on the same part of the roof at 5:30 amid tornado warnings in the area.
At 7:30, Rudy was back on the watch. I joined him at 8:30 and we went to look for Merry. We found him still on the 5th floor level but now on the other side of the entrance facing King Street. Rudy decided he would be safe there for the rest of the night. Walking out the Union Street entrance, I heard a robin making a big fuss. I looked to my left and up and there was a 2nd fledgling on one of the peaks of the old building!! A robin and starling were making a fuss about his presence. Rudy stayed on the ground, while I went back inside to see if I could id him but the light was getting too dark and he wouldn’t show his bands. Most likely it is Pippin! Who knows how his flight was down to that level went. The weather between 5:30 and 7:30 was extremely volatile with great big gusts of winds and a few short down pours. Rudy witnessed some spectacular flights by Caster, banking up towards the building and riding the wind high above the building. The 2 girls were on the nest box watching their brothers.
Photo courtesy of Tony Bergauer and Lisa Reh.
