June 04, 2015 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
Tracy Simpson Reports:
Thank you to all who were out at the watch today for day one of this community stewardship program. Katherine started off the day yesterday morning with a quick check before heading in to work and all three girls were now in the window well play fort. They were bopping around and having fun until all their breakfast energy was spent. It wasn’t long before the three were basking in the morning sun and relaxing. Margaret arrived around 9am and was joined by Grace. For the most part the day was relatively calm. Window well adventures, preening and napping were high on the agenda until late afternoon when the three girls began the call for food. In a baby peregrine’s world, screaming is most effective by flapping madly while doing it and so they all made sure that the adults were paying attention. By 2pm Bruce had joined the watch and things began to get interesting.
The resident adult female, Midnight, who I am sure was sensing the perfection of the moment (wind speed, direction, lighting, etc.) began a campaign that was bent on getting someone airborne. Midnight did fly-bys with food, touch and go landings and every other trick in her arsenal. This went on for over an hour and by Bruce’s account, the only thing she didn’t do was push one off herself! The three girls were excited by all of this but were not inspired to follow through. A valiant effort by Midnight and surely shows us what her intentions are for her three offspring… …let’s get to the air!!! Winston arrived for the evening close and a good feed came in at 8pm and Midnight beak fed all three. By 8:30 the girls were calming down and by 9pm the resident adult male, Renegade, arrived with more to eat. He decided to let the girls do with it what they will, dropped the package off, and left for his night watch post. By dusk two of the girls were in the box sleeping with the third in the window well.
Thank you to all of the watchers that participated yesterday! Today should be a raucous day as Midnight continues her efforts to get the girls out and flying.
Posted on June 4, 2015 8:04 am
June 03, 2015 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
Tracy Simpson Reports:
A huge thank you to Katherine who has been able to provide us with periodic updates on the activities of the three girls in the nest box… …or should I say window well! It would seem that yesterday all three of the MEC chicks discovered that the nest box is indeed elevated above the base of the window well and firmly placed so that it is level with the nest ledge. This gives them a gap beneath it to run back and forth under the box once they brave the hop down into the well itself. All three girls were in the well yesterday playing and exploring and when Midnight brought in food, she had to seek them out in their “play fort”. All three had a great feed and each in turn finally popped up to the ledge and back into the nest box for the night.
This is a great confidence building activity for the chicks as they begin to explore life outside the nest box and the great big world beyond it. The next usual step is that the chicks “jump the gap” from one ledge to the next and begin to explore other window wells along the nest ledge face of MEC 1 building their strength and confidence further. It doesn’t always go as planned as sometimes they will forego this step and move on to fledge. Margaret, Grace and Bruce will be on site today to be the “on the ground” crew and Katherine will provide us with a different perspective when she can.
Here we go folks! Anyone wishing to come out and help, we welcome you to join the community stewardship watch of the young ones. Contact us through our website or head office if you have time to share at the MEC watch this year!
Posted on June 3, 2015 8:07 am
June 02, 2015 - Kitchener - CTV-Bell Media Tower
Lisa Reh Reports:
Chroma, Reggie, Ginnie and Redbud are all growing rapidly and look like they are anxious to fly. They are no longer just fluffy white chicks, they are now black and white as their feathers grow in. The nest is strewn with many wings of seagulls and other birds. When the young ones are passed out after a meal it’s sometimes hard to tell where the falcons are as there are so many feathers in the nest box. Chroma is one large baby and has been flapping her almost grown wings like a grown falcon. Mystery brought in a seagull on Friday and poor little Reggie got all tangled up in the wings of the feast as she brought it into the nest box as his sisters clambered to get a piece of it. All are venturing out onto the balcony and are very active.
The chicks will be 37 days old on June 11, which is the official start of the fledge watch. A training session will be held on June 10 at 6:30 pm in the City of Kitchener parking lot by CTV off of Green Street. All are welcome and with 4 strong and active chicks we will need all the help we can get to keep these young falcons out of harms way! The watch will be on for about 10-15 days. If you are interested in joining the team, please visit the CPF home page and click on Volunteers to sign up.
Posted on June 2, 2015 11:48 pm
June 01, 2015 - Toronto - Canada Square Building - Yonge and Eglinton
Marion Nash Reports:
Lyn was able to get this picture of the 2 chicks on the ledge.
Posted on June 2, 2015 8:18 pm
June 02, 2015 - Brampton - Courthouse
Marion Nash Reports:
We are able to confirm the first hatch there could be more than 1 chick but mom is not getting up to allow a look.
Congratulations Brampton and CBRE!
Posted on June 2, 2015 8:15 pm
June 02, 2015 - Mississauga - Executive Centre
Tracy Simpson Reports:
With the three girls at the Mississauga Executive Centre getting older, bolder and bouncy we have pulled together the team that will start tomorrow the watch for these three jumbo jets. All three girls turn 38 days today and are looking more like the falcons they are to be and less like fuzzy gremlins. Adrianna is the most active and bold of the bunch and appears to have taken up the role of group spokesfalcon. Yesterday she was out of the nest box and on the porch with her sisters relaxing when suddenly she decided that the window well where the nest box is located looked like fun. She dropped down in which had Midnight over like a bullet to monitor her girl as she played with gack and ran back and forth beneath the nest box (the box being in a window well and elevated to match the ledge level which chicks at MEC love to run back and forth under and pop up on the other side). Adrianna (red tape) popped up onto the ledge after several hours and was content that her exploration was a success. Hawkeye (blue tape) and Ieva (yellow tape) were not as adventurous and were content to sit on the “porch” of the nest box flapping and preening the remaining visible down between their fast growing feathers.
Midnight is still feeding the three girls a ridiculous amount of food. Over the past 4 days Bruce Massey and I have been spot checking and at peak the resident adult female is feeding every hour and a half. At one point on camera I watched Midnight enter the box with food and the three sleepy girls ignored her… …thanks Mom but we’re good.
Tomorrow will be 39 days of age for the girls and so I dropped off the rescue carrier and towel yesterday and we officially start tomorrow with Margaret, Grace and Bruce holding the fort for the first two days with help from Katherine and Winston.
If you have time to help out at the Mississauga Executive Centre fledge watch this year, we would love to have you come out and join us! Any time that you can spare is always ALWAYS a huge help and contribution to the community team effort. Fledge watch typically lasts 10 to 14 days during which we cover as much of the day as possible. Once the young have shown that they can fly and land with control we will scale back the full watch and continue to spot check the progress of our youngsters. It is an amazing rollercoaster experience that I promise you will never forget! Visit our volunteer application area on our website or contact our head office to be a part of this amazing experience!
Posted on June 2, 2015 8:29 am
June 01, 2015 - Toronto - Sheraton Centre
Linda Woods Reports:
More food for the little one. Tiago delivered more food, but it looks like the little one just ate.
Posted on June 1, 2015 6:59 pm
June 01, 2015 - Toronto - Don Mills
Marion Nash Reports:
The boys still have a lot of down and have not really started their pre-fledge flapping exorcises yet so we plan on keep a close eye on the camera to see how they are doing but looks like fledge watch will start next week.
Posted on June 1, 2015 3:46 pm
May 29, 2015 - International, National and Local News
Mark Nash Reports:
Friday May 29th - 2015
Beachville Carmeuse Lime and Stone Quarries
Again, sorry for the lack of updates, but it has already been a very busy season and we are always stressed for resources and manpower at the best of times, and this time of year has us doing 14 plus hour days with or field activities and on-going banding events. Please remember that we are limited and subject to available funding and resources at hand, as we are not government funded and depend on contributions and donations along with allot of volunteer support availability to do many of the things we are involved in throughout the year.
Having being able to combine this visit with the London City Centre site visit, I was finally able to get back down to the Beachville nest site and the Carmeuse Lime and Stone Quarry to get an update on their resident peregrines. A big thank you to Lucie who also met me down there to do a pre-site inspection and gather some observations while I was meeting with the folks at the Quarry administrative offices.
With the support of the Regional Environmental manager and support staff at the Carmeuse Quarries, we were able to conduct our investigation and quickly found both of the resident peregrines on one of the large towers. During out site visit, both adult peregrines were quite aggressive and protective while we were at elevation around the suspected nesting cavity. Upon our initial arrival, the adult female was observed roosting on the upper ledge of the sister building with a large kill, and was in the middle of eating.
The adult male alerted to her screams, quickly appeared in our view and they both joined in their efforts to encourage us to leave!!
After we left our elevated observation position with the Quarry staff, the resident adult female peregrine quickly returned back to the covered nest location and disappeared from our view, where she spend the balance of the day light hours concealed and out of our view. She never appeared back in our view. The resident adult male landed and roosted on a spot of the adjacent building at elevation with a direct line of site into the nest cavity where his female mate had disappeared into hours ago.
At no time did we see another shift change and no food ever when into the nest cavity during the balance of our observation period, so we can be reasonably assured that there are no hatchlings being fed at this point.
It was quite obvious after Lucie and I departed the site much later in the evening around 9pm, based on our 8 plus hours of observations that the pair are currently involved in full time incubation of an undisclosed amount of eggs.
We will be back within the next two weeks to do a another check on the pairs activities.
A big thank you to Lucie for her support and for some of her attached photos!
Stay tuned……….
Posted on May 31, 2015 2:41 pm
May 29, 2015 - London - TD Tower
Mark Nash Reports:
May 29th - 2015
Its been a long time since we have been able to get back to the London City Centre nest site, but we can finally provide an update on what’s been happening. At the request of the building management, I was able to combine two visits today, one in London Ontario to the London City centre to gather an update on the status of the resident peregrines.
We have good new and not so good news to report.
First the good news,, in that we can confirm that there is still resident adult peregrines on the London City centre, and they are still very territorial and very protective of the nest building rooftop and still very much occupying and utilizing the old nest ledge. Upon our arrival, both adult peregrines were observed on the nest ledge. I was also able to photograph both resident adults, and can also confirm the adult male is dawning a solid Black band - (indicating that he is a Canadian produced peregrine),, and that the resident adult female is dawning a Black over Red leg band - (indicating that she is a USA produced peregrine). I was not focused at this time trying to get an identification or trying to ID their leg band numbers, but will return again in the next two weeks in an effort to get a positive identification of the two. See the attached photos of the adults.
The not so good new:
I was able to lower the new CPF wireless colour camera down from the upper roof elevation to gain a peek at the nest ledge. Sadly, it would appear that the resident pair have not been successful in producing any chicks this season. While we can not confirm if they did in fact produce any eggs this season, it was quite obvious given the recorded video footage that the camera captured that there is no eggs or hatchlings currently present on the nest ledge or in the nest tray.
Some detailed close-up footage of the nest tray clearly shows that the volume of pea-gravel in the old nest tray is almost all but gone and there isn’t much left in the nest tray for the peregrines to hollow out a nest bowl to allow them to properly incubate eggs. Remembering that this nest tray was installed sometime way back in 1995-1996 and has never been serviced or had its pea-gravel topped-up or cleaned to our knowledge. The old nest tray is also showing signs of rot and it may not be very long before its starts to fall apart.
Over the past three years, we have been involved in replacing all of the old CPF installed nest trays and nest boxes with the newer poly-composite materials that have a much longer life span and shelf life, in addition to replacing and/or topping-up the pea-gravel at each of the nest sites. Aside of the obvious, (providing new and improved materials and renewed nesting conditions), the new composite material does not delaminate or rot, their water resistant and UV protected, thus minimizes the liability of nest box and nest tray materials from rotting with pieces falling off and down to the ground where it could injure people or cause damage to automobiles at the ground level.
Most of the older nest boxes and nest trays that the CPF has manufactured and installed (now at some 19 different active peregrine sites), were originally installed way back in 1995 to 2000, and although served all quite well, these older pressure treated wood materials have succumb to rot and delamination due to the harsh Canadian weather conditions they have been exposed to for the past 15 to 20 years, and as such needed to be replaced.
We have posted some of the video footage taken of the nest ledge and old nest tray that confirms that while the resident pair of peregrines are still very much demonstrating territorial behaviour and still very active on the nest ledge, there is no evidence of eggs or hatchlings again season.
We hope to be back in the next two weeks to check out the other ledge elevations around the building just to ensure that they peregrines have not deceived us and decided to go to another ledge to produce. We know that the peregrines always have a second and third choice to nest on/in in the protected territory and want to ensure that the up and coming London City Centre events and window replacement projects will not be met with any surprises that could hamper or risk human activities.
You can see the London City Centre video footage of our nest ledge inspection at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZl7kLEEj5A
The video (and still photos taken from the camera video footage) were taken of both the left and right of the nest tray on the next ledge itself, and of the nest tray.
Sorry for the shaky video footage, but the wind was quite blustery and it was very difficult to control the camera on this day. 
Stay tuned……..
Posted on May 31, 2015 1:47 pm
