I like February.  Not for its weather but because it’s the time when peregrine falcons begin to court and claim territory in Pennsylvania.

After months of inactivity peregrine pairs are hanging out together and making their claims quite obvious.  Last Friday Dorothy and E2 did this by perching at the highest point at the University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning.  “This is ours!”

Yesterday Steve Gosser found a banded pair of peregrines at Presque Isle State Park’s Gull Point.  Though one of the falcons flew away, this one stayed close enough for Steve to get some great photos.

Gull Point is only 1.75 miles as the peregrine flies from downtown Erie where an urban pair would feel comfortable nesting, and not far from lakeshore bluffs if they prefer a pastoral setting.

I bet this Lake Erie pair is on territory.  Where will they nest?  Is anyone monitoring peregrines in Erie?

(photo by Steve Gosser)

Yesterday I got a call from Wildlife Conservation Officer Beth Fife.  An injured adult peregrine had been found in the mills area of Monessen, Pennsylvania, shown above in a photo linked from www.city-data.com.

Beth had already called the Game Commission’s peregrine falcon coordinator, Art McMorris, to tell him the band numbers but he was not available.  While waiting for Art’s return call she wondered about the bird’s identity.

I looked up the bands as best I could.  The bird was not from Pittsburgh or the Midwest.  My friend Karen Lang said, “Maybe it’s from New York.”   And she was right.

Juanita Woods identified her as Callidora, hatched at the Times Square nest, Rochester, NY in 2010.  Her father is Archer, grandson of Mariah and Kaver of Kodak.  Her mother is Beauty, daughter of Dorothy and Erie at the University of Pittsburgh.  Callidora is Dorothy’s granddaughter.

The news from Beth was not particularly good.  Callidora is at a rehabber’s in Indiana County, PA with a badly injured wing and will be x-rayed to determine the extent of the damage.  I don’t know the name or location of the rehabber and have no other news.  [Update: She was actually at Wildlife Works in Youngwood, PA.  Click here for more information.]

I expect to hear more next week as business gets underway again.  Not only is it the weekend, but it’s snowing and sleeting here with a projected 2-inch snow+ice accumulation.  Things have slowed down considerably.

For information on the town where Callidora was found, see City-Data’s website on Monessen.

I hope Callidora will be OK.

SAD NEWS, Jan 21, 1:50pm:   Beth Fife reports, “With further inspection and care of the wing, they found it to be totally shattered and non repairable.  The bird was put down.  Sad, but it’s not suffering anymore.”

Fly free, Callidora.

.

(photo of Monessen linked from the Monessen, Pennsylvania webpage at City-data.com)

It feels like a very long time since we watched peregrines nesting on the webcams.  This photo of Dori feeding her chicks at the Gulf Tower is more than eight months old.

But nesting season is not so far away.  This month peregrine couples are getting reacquainted, next month we’ll see them courting at the nest, in March the females will lay eggs.

In the meantime (at last!) I’ve created a slideshow of Gulf Tower nesting highlights from 2011.  The first slide is dated February 22. That’s just six weeks away.

Click on Dori’s photo for a look backward at Dori, Louie and their five chicks in 2011 and a reminder of what to look forward to next month.

(photo from the National Aviary falconcam at the Gulf Tower, Pittsburgh)

For peregrine fans there’s happy news at the Tarentum Bridge today.

Back in the spring of 2010, a pair of peregrines nested here over the Allegheny River.  The female’s bands indicated she hatched at the Benjamin Harrison Bridge near Hopewell, Virginia in 2008, so we nicknamed her Hope.  The male’s bands identified him as a hometown bird hatched at the Cathedral of Learning in 2008, son of Dorothy and E2.

Unfortunately their nest must have failed.  It was never found and no young were observed.

In early 2011 Hope was still present at the bridge but she had no mate.  In late spring she disappeared too.

After many months without a peregrine sighting, Rob Protz saw one perched on the bridge yesterday afternoon.  He called Steve Gosser who came over with his camera.

After waiting and watching for 20 minutes, Steve checked the navigation beam and found a pair!  Here they are, the female above the male.  We don’t know their identity yet but I’m sure we’ll find out as birders and photographers flock to see and document them.

If all goes well, Tarentum will have peregrine nestlings this year.

Just when you thought winter was dreary, peregrines spice it up. 

(photo by Steve Gosser)

Dorothy’s son, Stammy, and his mate Stellar had nested in Youngstown since 2005 but Stellar died last summer.

Peregrines in need of a good nest site go wandering in the fall and those in need of a mate advertise their availability.  I’m sure Stammy hoped a female would notice him in Youngstown — and one did. By early November peregrine watchers saw Stammy courting with a new lady.

Last Monday Chad and Chris Saladin stopped by Youngstown for a look and identified her as Strike, hatched in 2009 at the Cleveland Terminal Tower nest.

Chris wrote, “Strike spent this nesting season in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park at the Station Road Bridge nest site. She and McKinley had two chicks, but both chicks died in the nest. We saw Strike fly into the nearby CVNP Turnpike Bridge nest territory, where she had a couple skirmishes with the resident female, Lara, and hadn’t seen Strike since. ”

I’m glad that Strike found Stammy.  I hope their 2012 nest is a great success.

(photo by Chad+Chris Saladin)

Amy was in class on the 23rd floor of the Cathedral of Learning when she was distracted by a peregrine outside the classroom window.  She wrote, “I actually cried out in class, but most of the rest of the class seemed completely unmoved – their loss.  It was kind of torture to try to participate when I wanted to absorb every second of what the peregrine was doing.  …   It was there for half an hour, flew away, and returned for another 45 minutes or so. What a treat!”

A treat indeed!  It looks like Dorothy.  I wish I’d been there.

(photo by Amy Lewis)

Actually, she got home last Saturday.

Island Girl is an arctic peregrine who nests every summer on Baffin Island, Canada.  Then at the autumn equinox, on almost exactly the same day in September every year, she leaves for her winter home at Putu on the Chilean coast.

We know she makes this journey because in 2009 the Falcon Research Group’s Southern Cross Peregrine Project outfitted her with a satellite transmitter.  Since then they’ve followed her travels via satellite and plotted them on the web, a trip of 8,628 miles.

This year Island Girl changed her southbound route from an East Coast trajectory via Florida and the Yucatan to a slightly westward path over Lake Superior to the Gulf Coast at Mississippi.  When she encountered headwinds over the Gulf of Mexico she roosted on offshore oil rigs, then flew west to Texas and continued south.  Some days she rested, especially during bad weather.  On other days she pressed homeward, covering more than 200 miles.  From start to finish Island Girl traveled for 53 days — and this is considered a leisurely pace! 

Now she’s back in Putu surveying her domain.  Her favorite sandspit island is still gone, destroyed by the February 2010 tsunami, but she has many other options.  Her satellite GPS unit is so accurate that SCPP is able to tell where she roosts.

Island Girl is the last peregrine in the project with a working transmitter.  In February 2012 the Falcon Research Group will travel to Chile to capture two more arctic peregrines and outfit them with tracking devices. 

You can read about their work and Island Girl’s journey on the Southern Cross Peregrine Project’s blog (click on her picture).  See the map of her journey here.

I wish I’d remembered to check their website earlier so I could have followed her en route!

(photo of Island Girl from the Southern Cross Peregrine Project)

No.  After work I pulled motion detection images from the snapshot camera and found out our pair had been courting at the nest at 4:00pm.

Here’s the photo sequence from yesterday afternoon.

E2 saunters into the nest area.

“Dorothy, come here!”

As Dorothy arrives, E2 bows.

Dorothy bows low.

As usual, E2 leaves first.  

Courtship! Is it spring?

(photos from the National Aviary snapshot camera at the University of Pittsburgh)

Now that it’s quieter I decided to make a slideshow of this year’s highlights.  It took me a long time to create because every photo brought back memories. It was hard to choose favorites.

Click on Peter Bell’s photo of E2 carrying prey to see the results.

(photo by Peter Bell)

p.s. I’ll assemble a slideshow of Gulf Tower highlights as soon as I get a chance. If this one is any indication, it could take weeks!

We know the Pitt peregrines go there for the plentiful food (pigeons) but Dorothy might have a second connection to the place.  St. Augustine’s is Pat Szczepanski’s parish church.

Dorothy tolerates humans but she doesn’t trust them.  Pat Szczepanski is the only person I know for whom Dorothy will calmly relax, perch and preen for as much as an hour at the Cathedral of Learning, allowing Pat to take her picture through a window.

Pat built this trust through years of quiet, non-threatening observation. 

It’s an amazing coincidence that Dorothy’s favorite place to be when she’s not at the Cathedral of Learning is St. Augustine’s, Pat’s parish church her whole life. 

Is it just a coincidence?  Only Dorothy knows and she isn’t saying.

Pat took this picture of her hunting last Sunday.

(photo by Pat Szczepanski)