Birds and Nature

The Peregrine Falcon has finally moved to another branch on the same snag then flies away. This has been a very nice experience. SeEtta

The Peregrine Falcon preens each tail feather carefully providing a nice view of the upper side of it's tail. SeEtta

The flock of migrating swallows, the ones I could saw were Tree Swallows, along with a few resident Barn Swallows are flying all around the Peregrine Falcon with some coming in close. The falcon actively follows many of them. The Mourning Dove remains on top of the fence post behind the falcon. But the Peregrine Falcon makes no attempt to go after any of them-either it had just eaten a very big meal before I started watching it or it's a vegetarian. SeEtta

The flock of migrating swallows, the ones I could saw were Tree Swallows, along with a few resident Barn Swallows are flying all around the Peregrine Falcon with some coming in close. The falcon actively follows many of them. The Mourning Dove remains on top of the fence post behind the falcon. Go figure? SeEtta

To the left of the Peregrine Falcon is a Mourning Dove that flew in and landed on top of a fence post less than 50 feet away. The falcon continues watching a flock of migrating swallows fly below and makes some interesting movements with it's head as it does. At the end is some of the flock of about 70 Canada Geese that the falcon has been watching in the river. Though not viewable in this clip are several Eurasian Collared-Doves on other fence posts to it's right. This is a veritable 'kid in a candy store' with all the possible avian prey all around it and I kept thinking it is going to nail something here soon. SeEtta

In this short clip the Peregrine Falcon does more stretching. At the end of the clip the bird spots some migrating swallows below it and it follows the movement with it's head the same way one of us might watch a bird flying below us. SeEtta

The Peregrine Falcon that I found near Canon City,CO is seen doing some nice stretching in this short clip, providing additional views of the bird. All the video clips can be enlarged to fill a computer screen by clicking on the box (with 4 arrows) in bottom right corner of screen (at least it comes out clearly on my 14" laptop screen) SeEtta

I spotted a raptor on a snag that just looked a little different so I got closer and found it was an adult Peregrine Falcon. The snag was on a steep slope above the Arkansas River near Canon City,CO and within 15-20 miles of known Peregrine nesting locations in nearby foothills. I was able to drive my car to within about 200 feet of the falcon and behind a tree so I was at least partially obscured when videotaping the bird with my 40 power Canon videocamera. I watched it for an hour and this is what it did for most of that time--just chill-out and watch the parade of prey birds that came near including some rock pigeons that were flying close by during this clip. SeEtta