!!! Casey successfully fledges!
June 12, 2020 - Kitchener - CTV-Bell Media Tower
Lisa Reh Reports:
Fraser and Lucie were first on the watch and at 7:37, Fraser spotted Casey taking a flight towards the hospital!! He circled around and flew out of sight past the hospital. At 8:20 Casey could still not be accounted for and the call for reinforcements went out. Just after 9, more fledgewatchers started to arrive to look for Casey. Around 9:45, Sandye reports: Mystery was in the box feeding Artemis and Hope. Enigma was below the box feeding. Artemis has been flapping a lot on the verandah of the nest box and getting some lift. At 10:06, Casey flew back into the nest box!!
Karen reports, “It was relatively quiet for the next little while, other than the adults coming and going and trying to entice the young ones.” Looks like Enigma has been hunting meadowlarks. Photos courtesy of Karen von Knobloch.
David reports at 7:50 “Casey on upper platform, Hope and Artemis in the box. While we were there, we assume it was Casey who had a short flight (around 6:00 p.m.). We didn’t catch him leaving, or where he went, just saw him coming back accompanied by one of the parents. He at first landed on the inner white bars above the nest box, between the platforms. He hung out there for a while, periodically moving around. This while Mystery (we think) was on the upper platform, Kitchener edge, preparing (and/or eating) a fair-sized meal.
I think Casey knew it, as he kept moving around, and eventually flap/jumped to a slightly higher spot, then flew out again, a brief circle, and then up to the upper inner orange rail above the upper platform. No issue gaining altitude it seems. But he wasn’t satisfied there, watching his mom, fidgeted/moved around a fair bit, until he finally got up the nerve to fly down to the upper platform and joined his mom. Some sharing & some tugging away and back & forth ensued.
Eventually Mystery took the meal away, flew with meal first to Kings Tower, looked like she was going to land on the roof, disappeared briefly, then reappeared, flew to the Hospital roof, looked like she was going to land there, didn’t, then flew to the Sun Life tower and landed on the sign. Enigma was on the tower the whole time, on the outer railing of the upper platform.
After some time Mystery came back, Enigma took off and the two flew around for a couple of minutes, seeming to try to coax the others to fly. No dice, so they both ended up back on the CTV tower eventually, with Casey still on the upper platform and the other two still in the box, very active and vocal, but not ready to fly.
When I left the Green St. lot, Casey was still on the upper platform, the other two in the box, Enigma (I think) on the outer railing of the upper platform, almost directly above the box, and Mystery was perched on the middle of the cross-beam directly below the lower platform, on the King Street side.
As I was driving past the tower, I heard what seemed like an unusual racket, and pulled into the public lot behind CTV off Pine Street and got out to look. It looked like both adults had taken off, and chased each other around a bit. Finally one adult returned to the tower, and one disappeared. I think one ended up on the railing of the upper platform, above the nest box, (south corner) Casey was still on the upper platform, and the other two still in the box.”
