I will not have time to download other picutres till I get back . but I will summarize now from Sept 10 to last night Sept 15. We have still had falcons flying by. Male adult ushered 2 out the other day. I hope our youngster is hunting now. He is over 3 weeks behind university falcons.
Last night was quite funny.Youngster flew up to roof and there appeared to be a carcass up there. He seemed to be getting some good bites from it. The feathers kept ending up in his mouth. It was very cold and windy last night and he eventually went up onto nest box and just looked out. NO sign of adults. Youngster eventually flew off. 2 hours after we arrived adult female (miss Edmonton) flew in and up on aerial by nest box. She then flew off and went on aerial on west side of roof. The youngster came flying in cacking and chased her off and the youngster perched on R of Weber facing west.
Low and behold, in comes female adult down back alley with prey in her talons.She is quite low. Youngster flies off R and chases her. Just as the Miss Edmonton drops prey to kid, and kid goes to grab it, the prey flies off
(Yes, it was still alive)
The youngster was some upset and ended up low on a wire in alley west of Weber. We stayed there to make sure he was O./K. (Gord told to us to watch for the wires) . We got a good laugh here. Poor Peter was trying to video it and battery went dead
The youngster then flew off south. We went around to east side and adult female was on aerial above nest box and youngster was way south on a round satellite dish
Miss Edmonton looked up and started chupping. She flew around Weber and then went up to box. Next thing ,off she went ,and started soaring south. We see another falcon up in sky and it dove down suddenly and flew onto Weber sign facing east. It was finally the adult male making an appearance. I kept watching the sky for mom and noticed we now have 2 falcons up there , mom and another female(by size) They soar fast to the south and then soar fast to the north and we lost sight, in the clouds. Poor mom. Dad I think attracts too many females in his travels.
I had to leave for a few moments ;)and of course when I came back everything is happening and Peter is not sure what. He figures female came back and kid knocked someone off perch and was chased, or another juvenile came in. dad flew off and we do not know who is there. It was dark out and very confusing. One thing for sure. this site has given us heart attacks galore. When we left the kid was still cacking(he lost his supper) . He was on E of center and an adult was on R of WEber. We do not know who. I just hope Miss Edmonton made it back. I will probably not have time to check .
When I get back the youngster will have migrated and the adult male will have migrated ,but Miss Edmonton should still be there (God willing she is O.K.)
I find this a very difficult time of year. When they migrate, you never know if you will ever see them again. I will post some slide shows of a mixture of pictures of Red deer youngster and our youngster