MN / Great Spirit Bluff - 2016-22

[RCF]

Great news from the GSB nest. The jumper has been rescued and both were banded.

"John Howe has repelled down Great Spirit Bluff and is now cleaning the nest box after retrieving the remaining eyas. George Howe, hero of the search and rescue team, found the little jumper and brought it back up the bluff. Two eyasses banded today. Both males, names are Hamilton and Burr-d. Great work by the whole team, Amy Ries, David Kester, George Howe, and John Howe." There were photos but I do not know how to post here.

Here is a link to the photos   https://www.facebook.com/RaptorResourceProject/posts/1358936637476285

[GCG]

My sincere thanks RCF for the link. Next time I will know to copy and paste the link. TPC, I follow this nest site mainly on Facebook because the individual posts are not informative. Lots of chit chat between the watchers.

[The Peregrine Chick]

My sincere thanks RCF for the link. Next time I will know to copy and paste the link. TPC, I follow this nest site mainly on Facebook because the individual posts are not informative. Lots of chit chat between the watchers.

Makes perfect sense GCG! 

The reason I asked about Facebook or not is that with Facebook, some sites you need to be a facebooker yourself in order to access - RCF's link is exactly the way to post the link for that. (thx RCF)  If the link were to something else, you may well be able to link directly to the photo so long as the source/photo credit is included with the photo.

If you come across something like that, pm me and I can walk you through that ...

Thanks for keeping us updated on this site - interesting goings-on there ...

[GCG]

Another Facebook post AND video of the action prior to banding yesterday. Amazing!

"Yesterday we witnessed some “Great Performances” and that seems to be an understatement reflecting on the amazing rescue jobs of Michelle pulling her two young back into the nest box (https://youtu.be/dL-sAa9pqd8). We have not witnessed this on camera before, but many peregrine falcon eyrie choices are small spaces of only a couple square feet and that obviously has led to raptor parenting skills being honed when it comes to curious and exploring young. The team effort to rescue and band drew on years of experience in falconry reintroduction and monitoring techniques taught and shared by our founder Bob Anderson who, in that sense, was with us yesterday from developing a plan, to execution.
The RRP falcon team includes the multiple talents of Amy Ries and Dave Kester who both did amazing work preparing and implementing a plan. Amy managed the inspection, banding and treatment of the two young males (Hamilton and Burr-D) and Dave’s experience handling falcons confirmed good options for nest box and falcon treatment. We now fondly refer to Amy as “Dr. Quinn…medicine woman” and we can only hope that this wave of insect pests at the nest box has been managed long enough for our young falcons to fledge more leisurely. We are learning that in the real world, many falcon young don’t have a textbook fledge as we would like to imagine.
Thanks to our many volunteers and helpers – they include dedicated landowners like George Howe who twice now has joined the RRP search and rescue team to scale the treacherous talus slope below the bluff to retrieve prematurely fledged falcons. His recovery of Burr-D and story of transporting him back up in a Teletubby pillowcase is amazing and allowed us to seemingly pull off a “magic act” of pulling one falcon out of the box and replacing it with two! I’m very proud of the RRP team and appreciative of your kind words, encouragement, and support of our work."
John

[susha]

Wow!  Amazing!!  Thanks for sharing, GCG.

It's so comical to watch her try to sit on him after she rescues him!   

[Jazzerkins]

Sure pulled a lot of fluff off the little one while rescuing.  I guess was trying to get a good hold to drag it back in.

[GCG]

A video link to an interview with George Howe, the man who rescued the (jumper) chick. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_XSHv79hso

[GCG]

It appears that the jumper has once again jumped (fallen) from this nest on June 3rd. After seeing a FB post, I watched a video of the fall. Once from a distance and also a close up. After watching, I went to the site and from the chats, the remaining chick has also fallen. So much has happened at this amazing site.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiUErODSKfo

On the link to the site, they are showing the banding.   

[GCG]

This is what is posted on Facebook. 

Raptor Resource Project
June 3 at 7:39pm ·
"We are aware that Hamilton and Burr-D are out of the box at Great Spirit Bluff. The two falcons are around 28 days of age today and we have decided not to try to bring them back to the box. Michelle and Newman will find them and care for them until fledge, as we saw in 2013 and 2014. We will see if we can locate them with the camera, but we have no intention of going to the base of the cliff, which could drive them deeper into the tangle below. We are hopeful for both little falcons and will keep everyone posted.
We're getting questions on the box design and production at Great Spirit Bluff. Are the falcons falling because the perches are poorly designed? In short, no - but you can read more about the issue here: http://bit.ly/2qNSRsJ
John is thinking about ways to design the replacement box that will minimize problems with black flies. We are about 40% of the way through our banding season and it looks like black flies and weather plagued impacted many of our wilder sites this year. We'll talk about that later this week."

[GCG]

I forgot to mention that the 2 chicks were given their names by a Hamilton (Broadway play) fan. 

[GCG]

2018 NESTING SEASON

A new season and the 1st arrival has been seen many times. Can our residents be far behind?

https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/gsb-falcons/

[GCG]

Both residents are back at this site and confirmed that it is Newman ad Michelle.

"Male is Newman, an unbanded falcon, confirmed by field marks on February 27.
Female is Michelle P/87, confirmed by band number on March 4th. She is a 2005 hatch from Maassen’s bluff in Nelson, WI.
Female 89/(unknown) visited the box on February 28, but vanished before Michelle arrived."

https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/gsb-falcons/

[GCG]

I forgot to say there are 2 cams operating at this nestsite. One shows an aerial view and the other is a close view of the nest.

https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/gsb-falcons/

[GCG]

Courting his lady with a meal. Video is dated March 16th.   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLeNR2ocnlCOdeI6ZqC3YP4kFkH32oxi8W&time_continue=27&v=akGKwOKWKr4

[GCG]

Michelle is busy doing what female falcons do at this time of year. Have been unable to find a blog that from the site, or commenters posts. Should be 1 or 2 for sure.