|
|
Hamilton Falconwatch News
OPPORTUNITY FOR YOUTH
Tuesday, March 10, 2026 - Hamilton Green Venture's spring 2026 cohort of Youth Stewardship & Professional Skills will be run in partnership with Hamilton Falconwatch, and applications are now OPEN! Youth participants aged 14 - 25 will have the opportunity to learn about peregrine falcons (and meet one!), discover connections between air quality and human and animal health, develop event planning skills and assist in planning a public event, network with peers and sharpen professional skills, and much more.This cohort will run weekly, spanning 11 weeks from April 1 - June 10, 2026, and will be delivered as a hybrid program with some in-person sessions at 22 Veevers Drive, one potential session downtown to participate in a Falconwatch volunteer shift, and a session in-person at the central HPL for Clean Air Day 2026. The deadline to apply for this cohort is March 25th, 2026 at 11pm. Check out greenventure.ca/stewardship for more information and to apply!
SPRING IS COMING
Monday, February 23, 2026 - Nesting season is still a month away, but Judson is already getting into the habit of bringing meals to McKeever. Peregrines generally form long term mating bonds, but courtship still happens every spring. We will see more of this activity in the coming weeks, with some breaks for the inevitable cold weather. We will start watching for eggs mid-March.DONATIONS NEEDED - Now is the time to show your support for our Hamilton Peregrines! The Coordinator daily reports, the camera images and on-street Falconwatch equipment are all made possible by your contributions. Grants only pay for so much (and some years they are less than others). Please click on the yellow 'Donate!' button above to make an easy tax creditable donation. We and the birds Thank You!
BACKGROUND FOR 2026....
After their fourth successful year together, fledging four chicks, Judson and McKeever are spending the winter in Hamilton, where there is ample food, and warm spots to shelter from the worst of the winter weather. This will be McKeever's fifth year at the Hamilton nest, and Judson's sixth.
Judson arrived in Hamilton at the end of the nesting season in 2021. He came to us from Buffalo, New York, where he fledged from the Richardson Complex in 2018. In a delightful turn of events, one of his parents is Felker who fledged from Hamilton in 2012. So the prodigal (grand)son of Madame X and Surge has returned. He arrived too late to mate with Lily, who, sadly, fell ill and died early in 2022, so, apart from a brief time keeping Lily company on the ledge, his first and only mate has been....
McKeever, fledged from a nest on the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ontario, in 2019. She is named in honor of Kay McKeever of the Owl Foundation. Her arrival was first noticed on January 22, 2022, when we observed that there were still two adults landing at the nest ledge while Lily (the previous female) was being cared for at the Owl Foundation. A quick check of our webcam archives showed that McKeever had been present for a few days by that point. We don't know if she had a territorial battle with Lily which resulted in the latter being too injured to survive, or whether Lily had taken ill and this newcomer had simply filled in the void left by Lily's absence. In any event, McKeever was quickly accepted by Judson, and the pair produced four chicks their first year together, and four more in 2023. In 2024, three chicks hatched, but, sadly, one of them died from an unknown illness before fledging. The remaining two chicks fledged strongly without any need for rescues. Last year the pair successfully fledged four chicks, with the help of Falconwatch team members who rescued chicks from ground level several times. One chick, Lawfield, was injured and required an extended stay at the Owl Foundation. He was returned to the nest in August, and was quickly welcomed back by the parents.
While peregrines are normally a migratory species, sometimes they choose to spend the winter in their nesting territory if there is enough food to last through the winter. Many bird species exhibit a trait called 'site fidelity'. If at least one of a pair that used a nest site in the previous year returns, and if there have been no significant physical changes to disturb either the nest itself or the birds generally, they will use the same nest site year after year. Peregrine Falcons are known for this trait. This will be the thirty-second year the same nest site on the Sheraton Hamilton Hotel has been used.
To read FalconWatch Reports from previous years, click on the History button above.
Thank you to all our visitors and supporters for your ongoing encouragement.
|
|
|
Web page created by
Charles Gregory
Web Pages and All Contents (C) Copyright - Hamilton Community Peregrine Project