So that brings me to a question which may sound rather simpleton, but do peregrine falcons make more than one scrape in an individual nestbox and then the female chooses which one she favours? Or do they make scrapes in a variety of different locations and the female chooses the location and scrape she prefers?
Both. There were two scrapes in the Radisson nestbox this year - one where they are and one right below the inside-box cam. In years when the Radisson birds nested on the ledge, we would have scrapes in the nestbox as well. With the West Winnipeg birds, Beau would make scrapes in the nice nestboxes and twice Jules has ignored his creations. Now whether its purely a case of the female saying I like this spot and its a good thing there's a scrape here or whether the male takes clues from her and concentrates his efforts more where she has indicated a preference or whether he indicates his preference by making a better scrape in one location than another, I'm afraid I can't say.
I should also mention that while the males do most of the scraping the females do participate, though it seems they do more of the latter renovations and they tend to spend more time at it as time goes along - and sorry for this cliche, but the males hop into the box, scrape for a couple of minutes then they are off again - the females will continue to work at it for 10 or 15 minutes by comparison.
