Peaceful Evening

I'm tempted to say "cat nap" but that wouldn't be quite right. So let's go with "just snoozin'."

A facelift for this blog

While we wait the hatching of eggs, I have updated the page. Frankly, I never did like the old one, because it was a bit hard to read. My old eyes couldn't take it any more!

Nothing much happening

All's quiet in the nest box for now.

Easy Does It

Family Conference

Group thanks

To everyone thanking me. There are too many to keep track of, so thanks to all. Glad you like the site.

Here's another 'how can I tell them apart' example:



Kinney is on the right, of course. You can see the size difference, and you can see Kinney's silvery leg band clearly.

KathyQ and her four eggs

I carefully enlarged and adjusted the camera shot to get a clear, clean, close up.

Boy, am I clairvoyant?

It wasn't more than a few minutes after my previous post that egg #4 made it's appearance.

Click the small picture to see the 'movie' of egg #4's arrival

Click the next two for larger views

Before

And after

Getting close to 'egg time'

Perhaps. While watching for #4 to possibly appear - and KathyQ was being fairly animated the past few minutes making me wonder if it is about to arrive - this showed up on the viewer window.

Window Washers!

Thanks to Richard K, our true expert on Kinney and KathyQ, I have corrected my comments. Kinney, the male, was on the perch and KathyQ was the one flying about. I had it backwards.

It does not make KathyQ happy when her territory is invaded.



Nor does Kinney care for it, although he sticks by the eggs and watches closely.

The window washers must have some experience, they only climbed out a window half-way up the side rather than starting from the roof.


Well that was really pretty boned-headed. They used the nestbox as a device to hold their ropes in place. Fortunately their weight tugging on the ropes didn't appear to damage the box.

About Shenandoah

There was a live-trap set out on Camera 3 this afternoon. Evidently the plan was to trap a predator stealing eggs from the peregrine nest.

I happened to 'tune in' and got the following sequence (click the picture to see all photos). It's a little strange, but I guess the Park Rangers came for their 'perp' (who was by now IN the trap.

Shenandoah Falcons

The camera is now blacked out. Right before that, it was jostled around a bunch, and ended up looking up into the clouds.

UPDATE:

Now that a couple of hours have passed, the camera is back on, but showing a view that overlooks a ledge and a valley. So what I captured was the camera being removed from it's previous location.

Make your own caption

Just loved this one. That appears to be Kinney by the eggs (silvery leg band), looking rather sheepish, dontcha think?

By the way, this post and the previous one happen to show both adults in nearly identical poses, and exactly the same distance from the camera. So as luck would have it, there's a perfect size comparison for you!

Number 3

It's here. It arrive just before 7:30am. (My computer clock where I made the movie was about 5-6 minutes slow, so the times it marked are off just a little).

And I caught the sequence. I combined the captures into a 'movie' sequence. Click the small picture below to see it.

As if on cue

Egg number 2 was laid in the predawn hours today, around 4:30 EDT. I was sound asleep, but here's a look from a bit later in the AM.

A restless day

It almost seemd like KathyQ was trying to figure out her egg. Several times she got up and just loooooked at it. All in all, she was fairly restless this evening. The experts are saying an egg COULD be laid as soon as tonight.

YES IT IS!

In the light of day, mom has granted us a glimpse at the scrape. Please, IndyStar, move the camera. We need to see the scrape, not the sign.

Here's a closer look:

Is it? Or isn't it?

I've been processing and reprocessing this image. I just can't tell if there's an egg or not. But I was watching and grabbing frames right after 8pm. This would seem to be KathyQ, as 'she' is staying on the scrape. She was sitting there and raised up, seemed to look under herself, rotated a couple of times and has been virtually motionless since then.

Honey, I'm Home!

Just caught this one on the cam!

Shadows of night

What are you looking at?

We all want to know. Is there an egg? Both Kinney and KathyQ have been in the box a lot this morning. FOr a half hour or so they've appeared to be looking at something, or maybe it's just more of the normal courtship 'bowing' activity.

Waiting, waiting

Thankfully, IndyStar got the 'ledge' camera working again.

But where's KathyQ? And when will there be eggs laid? "The waiting is the hardest part" according to Tom Petty's song. We all probably agree on that.


I can't tell who this is, but 'seems' large. But at this time, I'd been watching Kinney on the perch, so I'm inclined to think this is him.

The last time I definitely saw KathyQ was 2 days ago.

New blog feature

Google has begun putting blog photos into their Picasa tool. So all the photos I have posted will be (eventually, they say) available their for quick viewing.

This is the link to my Picasa gallery:

Waiting Game

One year ago tomorrow, the first egg was laid. So we wait and watch. It concerns me that the camera in the nest box seems to chop off the picture a lot of the time. I hope this isn't an indication it's starting to malfunction.

Welcome to the 2007 season

We're back!


Last year only 3 of the 4 eggs hatched. The 2006 story ended on sad note, with Alexa being found dead on the street July 7th.



Now it is time to watch for a new batch of offspring to arrive. Let's hope for a good year.

Did you know we also have a growing Bald Eagle population? I spent quite a bit of time watching and photographing them last month.