Parliament Pair

Saturday June 23rd


From others, namely Rose, Morg and Stuart from the LPP who had monitored them over the last week or so doing a great job, I knew before I arrived at 4.45am that they had fledged and were on the wing. Even better all 4 were safe and sound and were flying strongly.

The adults getting in on the frivolities

If you watch peregrines, dawn is always the best time to watch them, as I am getting older, just turned 55 no less, getting up at silly o’clock is getting harder. It is the best time to watch them, all that is on the adults and juveniles mind is FOOD! This makes them very very active and such was the case when I arrived, I could hear them a 100 metres away from the nest site, the noise was unbelievable, the sight even better.
Briefly all 6 were in the air interacting, a staggering sight in anyone’s book, even for me who has watched them for over 12 years, seeing this in the heart of London make all those early mornings worthwhile.
As expected as soon as I disembarked from the car, all had dispersed around the structure. The weather was not too bad, not great, a little overcast but possibly good enough to get some half decent photos. I decided to have a look round to see if I could find myself a spot out of the way so not to draw attention to the birds, mind you the racket they were making they were impossible to ignore.

I found myself a spot on a little private factory estate, not viewable from the road so I tucked myself away around a corner and waited. At this stage in there development the juveniles are still flying low, they are not street wise like the adults who will only come down so far, with the juv’s there are no boundaries as yet.
Staying in one position is limited but I did get to record some excellent behaviour, I was facing the light/dark stretch of sky for most shots but not too bad otherwise.
Watching the juveniles, as usual it is a first come first serve basis when it comes to food; basically this means that if the Tiercel is spotted far out bringing in prey, it is who can get to him first. He bought in prey on 3 occasions, he was intercepted on all, sometimes by up to 3 juveniles, airborne food passes took place. After this the trick was to get back to the structure without your brother or sister nailing you from underneath and then losing your meal. On one such time a feral pigeon was dropped, all the Tiercels hard work undone by two scrapping juveniles.

Juv on Juv

While I was watching it looks as if the juveniles are already following the adults and travelling further afield, on one such foray, the direction they were taking would have took them straight to Parliament. If they have not already been there, it is only a matter of time, possibly this week hopefully. Watching these juveniles compared to last year’s juv’s seems to show that these are more active and adventurous. Much of this is very likely down to the weather, at the moment we have good winds, sometimes too strong, it makes flying effortless for them and they can roam more, all the time building up wing strength.
I decided after to go to Parliament to check to see if any peregrines were present, lo and behold the Tiercel was there, very likely having a breather from the kids.
I will check again next weekend, I have a feeling that they may be at Parliament.

Tiercel back at Parliament

Art at Parliament, very nice too.