On Sunday afternoon five of us scoured Downtown Pittsburgh looking for the peregrine falcon pair who haven’t used the Gulf Tower nest since March 10. They’ve got to be nesting somewhere by now, but where? Our Peregrine Quest came up with mixed results.
Doug walked Gateway Center/Market Square. Denise and her husband checked midtown including the 2012-2013 nesting zone. I checked Penn/Liberty and went to the North Shore for a wider view and John English went to Flag Plaza. Only John saw peregrines and he saw them almost immediately. (UPDATE: See Doug’s comment below.)
After John texted me with two peregrine sightings back-to-back — one flew past BNY Mellon down the Forbes-Fifth canyon and one perched on UPMC (U.S. Steel Building) — I raced over to Flag Plaza to see them, too. I hadn’t been there long before we saw an exciting but silent interaction.
A female peregrine was flying around UPMC and approaching the building again from the left when a male peregrine popped out from behind the building (using it as a blind) and attacked her from above! She evaded his dive-bombing and sailed around UPMC one more time, then circled up and sailed off toward Oakland.
Here’s a map of the buildings (red pins), the peregrine perch (green pin), our vantage point (brown pin), and the peregrine flight paths during our half hour of watching. After the attack the male perched on UPMC for a while but we missed seeing him leave.
View Downtown Pittsburgh, Peregrine Tussle, 3/22/15, 2pm in a larger map
Why would a male peregrine attack a female during nesting season? The only time I’ve seen this happen is when the pair has eggs in the nest, the female is busy at the nest, and a new female shows up. The male then defends his territory, nest, and mate from an intruding female. So my guess is that the Downtown peregrines already have a nest.
We learned that they’re spending time at this end of town, but we still don’t know where they’re nesting.
(view from Flag Plaza, photo by Kate St. John with lousy late afternoon light)
Thanks for the updates Kate, they’re always fascinating.
I thought I may have had a possible peregrine sighting above the parkway west, approaching the Green Tree water tower this past Saturday. The sighting happened too fast to make out any plumage markings, but the speed of flight and wing shape were distinctive. About 500 feet or less after this sighting, I spotted a red-tailed hawk on a light pole–so maybe a peregrine is still defending this area?
Hi Kate, I was on Oliver near Wood at around 3:15 when one flew over from the direction of the point toward the Gulf Blbg. I did get the binocs on it but couldn’t tell if it was male or female. It also did not have anything in its grasp. We can always try again. I did find that there are a great many nocks and crannies for them to nest in all over downtown. Doug
Kate, you may remember a few years back when our male Dot.ca dive bombed Beauty during nesting season in Rochester, NY. He lost his mate Unity due to a vehicle collision and Beauty returned to the nest box that same evening. She had just been released from rehab due to battle with Unity earlier that season. Both Dot.ca and Beauty felt they owned that nest box, and there were many dive bombings. Today it is hard to fathom that that occurred, when they are such a bonded pair now. It literally took years for that to happen. If your downtown male lost his mate, he could be rejecting a new female right now.
Interesting perspective, Joyce. I’d forgotten about that episode at Rochester. If it’s happening now at Gulf it would explain why no one is at the nest box.
Gulf Tower has a lot of lights on it….often moving lights…. could all that light have chased the pair to a new, darker home?
Sue, last year they nested at Gulf successfully after the lights had been there 2+ years … so, at least for last year, it wasn’t the lights.
Are there any updates on Dorothy and E2?
Jean, they are both still at Pitt but Dorothy is unlikely to lay viable eggs. She’s very old for a peregrine.
I’m not a trained peregrine-watcher but I do some work Downtown and I look around when I can. Today (Mar 24) at 9:40 am, from the Grant St. side of One Oxford Centre, I observed a large bird flying in the vicinity of the BNY Mellon tower and the UPMC tower. I didn’t catch the takeoff, but watched a bird with fairly long-and-slender wings alternating 8-12 vigorous wingbeats with a flat-winged glide in a rising spiral over BNY Mellon and Grant Street, then peeling off in a figure-8 to loop over the UPMC tower. Circled in and out of view, eventually disappearing behind the UPMC tower, so unless it continued to the north I guess it must’ve landed on the north side of BNY, or on the roof or north/east sides of UPMC.