The senior monitor of a group watching over a pair of falcons living atop the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Hamilton says the satisfying part of the gig is bringing back a species that used to be considered endangered.
Pat Baker says things were not looking good for the breed in the late 1980s but commitments from volunteers, wildlife experts and the Ontario government to protect habitat over decades have put the speedy birds in a better position today.
“There was a huge effort put on to try to bring this breed back to or remove it from the endangered species, and they are now a species of special concern, and we’d like to keep it that way,” Baker told 900 CHML’s Good Morning Hamilton.
The Hamilton Community Peregrine Project is now keeping an eye on three eggs laid in the past week and now residing atop the downtown Sheraton Hotel, a nesting spot for the species over the last 28 years now.
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“It’s absolutely ideal for them they’ve got plenty of food in the neighbourhood. They have no predators around at all,” Baker revealed.
“It’s a very comfortable nest, large for them, very similar to something that they might encounter in the wild.”
McKeever arrived in the Hamilton-area in January 2022, shortly after the death of Lily the same month, the hotel ledge’s previous resident female.
The falcon is named in honour of Kay McKeever, who co-founded the Owl Foundation — a Vineland Station sanctuary that rescues injured owls before sheltering, nursing and releasing them back into the wild.
Judson is McKeever’s mate, he arrived in Hamilton from Buffalo at the end of the nesting season in 2021.
The pair had four chicks during last year’s mating season.
Baker says the birds have begun incubating the eggs with McKeever doing the bulk of that work.
Hatching typically anywhere from happens 30 to 34 days. If the incubation is successful, the new chicks will be seen in the last week of April.
The chicks will be dependent on the parents for about two months, before being kicked out to fend on their own.
“They usually leave towards the end of August, early September,” Baker explained.
“They may go just a little bit beyond Hamilton … but basically the area the parents now have is their territory.”
Status updates on McKeever and Juson can be seen at falcon.hamiltonnature.org
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