At approximately 3:20 this afternoon the 3rd chick hatched. What appeared to be a pip was noted this morning but it was difficult to confirm, as the attentive parents kept the egg well hidden today.

The two chicks that hatched yesterday appear quite vigorous and have been fed several times. Impressively, the youngest chick- not to be outdone by its older siblings - lifted its head and got in on a 4:45pm feeding. This is less then 1 1/2 hours after hatching! By all indications these three chicks are healthy and doing well.

Now we'll keep our eyes open for the 4th egg to hatch.

It certainly has been busy at the Richmond nest box today! The second chick hatched at about.... The first chick has dried out and its fluffy white natal down is obvious now. The second chick has successully hatched (although the adult rolled it out of sight before it completely escaped the remnant of its egg). We'll keep watching for pips on egg 3& 4

The first of the Richmond peregrine falcon chicks has hatched. At 2:30pm the young falcon chick (also called an eyas) finally emerged! We'll continue to monitor the progress of the other three eggs.

This morning a small pip (or hole) was seen on one of the eggs at 8:25 am. Captured still images also hinted at a small hole on a second egg but it was hard to immediately confirm this.

At this time (1:21pm) we can clearly see that two eggs have pipped. Towards the end of the video you can briefly see one of the chick's bills protruding through the hole. Hatching is physically demanding for these chicks and it may be some time before they completely free themselves from their eggs.

We are aware of the current camera outage and are coordinating with our project partners to resolve the issue. While the public feed is down we are still able to directly monitor the camera and will be sure make timely posts of any significant happenings at the nest.

Currently the adults continue to closely monitor the eggs and there is no indication of any pips. The female has appeared somewhat restless, frequently repositioning the eggs.

At 4:15 the male took over duty in the scrape.

We expect the eggs to begin hatching sometime within the next few days. Peregrine falcons typically incubate their eggs for 33-35 days. Incubation usually begins with the 2nd to last egg laid (May 29th this year) - but this year the start of incubation was a bit of an on again/off again affair, so pinpointing exactly when incubation began was a bit tricky. Regardless, we should see the first egg hatch soon.

The interior of the eggshell is lined with membranes that together form what is called the chorioallantois. The many blood vessels of the chorioallantois pass oxygen through the outer shell and to the developing embryo (while expelling carbon dioxide). Metabolic wastes are also transported to this membrane. Since being laid the egg has been slowly but steadily losing water through the pores of the shell, as a result the egg actually weighs less now then when it was laid. The shell is somewhat thinner now as some of the calcium in the eggshell has been absorbed by the embryo and used to help build its developing bones.

At this point the embryo's development is largely complete. The chick will reposition itself inside the egg bringing its bill close to the air space that occupies the end of the egg. The embryo is absorbing what remains of the yolk into its abdomen and will begin to absorb and remaining fluid in the egg as well.

The embryo pierces the air space with its bill and breathes with its lungs for the first time. Now the real work of hatching begins. The hatchling will use two specialized structures in this demanding process: the egg tooth a small, sharp structure on the upper beak of the young bird(this will fall off shortly after hatching) and the complexus muscle (also called the pipping muscle). This muscle is greatly enlarged prior to hatching and is used to brace the head as the egg tooth is rasped repeatedly across the shell. Eventually the hatchling breaks through or pips and a small hole will be seen at the end of egg. The hatchling will rotate within its shell, continuing to score the shell until it is has created an opening large enough to emerge through. The chick will rest frequently during this demanding process. The entire process can take days.

By delaying initial incubation the time between hatching of each egg has been reduced. All of the eggs in a clutch typically hatch within 24-48 hours of each other. This is important as it reduces the disadvantage the youngest chick faces in competition with its siblings

The parents can hear and feel the activity inside the egg and may respond to it - especially at the later stages of the process. Once the hatchling has begun to breathe with its lungs it can also begin to make soft calls which the parents can hear and may become louder as hatching progresses. We have already noted the adults peering closely at the eggs over the last day or so.

The falcons at Riverfront Plaza in Richmond continue to surprise. On Sunday May 31st, at about 3:30 pm a fourth egg was noted by camera viewers. This should be the last egg of the clutch as nests with more then four eggs are unusual.


Spiders have again begun to weave webs across the protective dome that houses the camera. At times the strong morning sunlight glares strongly off these webs, causing the camera's auto-focus to focus on the webs as opposed to the nest. Adjustments have been made to the camera which will hopefully minimize this problem


Peregrine falcons incubate for 33-35 days. Pinpointing exactly when incubation began for this clutch is somewhat tricky, as even after the third egg was laid incubation during the day was not consistent, possibly due to warmer temperatures for this relatively late nesting attempt. We can state that the the eggs will be expected to hatch at the very end of June or the beginning of July.

This morning Falcon Cam viewers were intrigued by glimpses of what appeared to be a third egg. After watching throughout the day we have finally been able to get a clear view of the third egg.

Whether or not this will be the final egg of the clutch remains to be seen. Although a typical clutch contains four eggs, this pair did lose an egg only a few days before nesting here on May 24th. Once the second egg was laid on May 27th we saw incubation begin, especially during the cooler evening and early morning hours.

Both the male and female will incubate the eggs, although the female generally assumes the majority of this duty. The birds develop brood patches, featherless areas on their breast that become highly vascularized, carrying the parent's warm blood close to surface of their skin. This allows the adults to more efficiently transfer body heat to the eggs. The female's brood patch will be more developed then the male's. Incubation will not be constant as the parents need only maintain the eggs at an optimum temperature. With the relatively warm weather (Today = high 85 deg - low 62 deg) this is less of a challenge for this late renest.

Although the female spent much of the morning hours incubating, she has since spent significant time off of the eggs thisafternoon. At the time of this entry (5:40pm) she is again incubating. This makes it more difficult to guess exactly how many eggs will eventually make up this clutch. We'll simply have to wait.

As the last light faded from the Richmond sky last night (May 26th), the female seemed as if she might be getting ready to lay the second egg of this clutch. Unfortunately, even with the night vision mode engaged we were not able to discern what was happening in the nest.

This morning found a second egg. The female was incubating this morning, indicating that we can probably expect one more egg to fill out this clutch.

Sometime before 5pm on Sunday, May 24th the Richmond Falcons laid an egg in the nest box on the Riverfront Plaza West Tower. This followed a period of scraping (creating a shallow depression in the nest substrate) and courtship/mating at the nest box that began on Friday.

More eggs are likelyforthcoming. A typical brood for falcons in our area consist of four eggs (although more occasionally occur). As the female had recently laid one egg (which fell and broke) on the Bank of America building, we'll have to see how many eggs ultimately make up this clutch. Both the male and female continue to be seen at the nest box. The egg is not yet being incubated. Peregrine falcons generally begin incubation with the second to last egg of a clutch (yet another indication that more eggs are on the way).

Stay tuned!

From 2003-2005, the Richmond falcons nested (successfully, with a lot of help from DGIF in moving chicks to the roof to make them safe) on the 17th floor balcony of the BB&T building. Because that balcony is not a safe nesting site, we blocked access to the nest box after the birds moved successfully to nest at Riverfront Plaza in 2006 and 2007. During the non-breeding season, we also placed some bricks and cinder blocks on that balcony to further discourage the falcons from nesting there.

Biologists with the DGIF Nongame Wildlife Program continue to monitor the Richmond peregrine falcons. We have seen the birds copulating several times recently, indicating that they are preparing to nest. Given the late date, we presume that the pair already has suffered a nest failure this spring.

For the last couple of weeks our biologists have spent considerable time tracking the falcons in downtown Richmond. The pair has focused on the southeast balcony ledge on the 17th floor of the BB&T building; the same balcony used as a nest site by this pair in years past (2003-05). Difficulties associated with this site for both the falcons and biologists led us to block access to the BB&T nestbox after the pair moved to Riverfront Plaza in 2006 (see March 21st blog, below). The female briefly visited the ledge of the Riverfront Plaza nestbox on May 14th, but the gravel in that box shows no sign of disturbance. Both adults have been spending significant amounts of time on their favorite perches in their “downtown” territory.

On Friday, May 15th, DGIF Nongame biologists surveyed all of the BB&T building 17th floor balconies for eggs or prey carcasses, and both falcons aggressively defended the windows at the 17th floor balcony nestbox. An abandoned falcon egg was found on the balcony on the opposite (NW) corner of the 17th floor, but the falcons did not defend any windows other than those at the nestbox. It is surmised that the egg is all that remains from a spring 2009 nest failure. The egg was collected and will be submitted for laboratory testing.

From the birds’ behavior over the last couple of weeks, we believe they are preparing to renest, likely in the downtown area. Given this situation, we decided to accommodate them to the extent possible, rather than continuing to discourage them from nesting on the BB&T balcony. The bricks and cinder blocks placed on the BB&T balcony to discourage nesting were removed, and the nestbox covers will be removed as well, as soon as practicable and without further stressing the adult birds.

As an interesting and perhaps prophetic note, in 2007 this pair was very defensive of the BB&T balcony during their renest courtship right up through May 14th; then on the 15th the female laid the first egg of her renest clutch in the nestbox at Riverfront Plaza! We will simply have to wait and watch.

Update on 2 Richmond Falcon “babies”
A US Fish & Wildlife Service biologist banding chicks at the peregrine falcon nest on the Legg Mason Building in Baltimore discovered that the nesting pair was comprised of two new birds. The male of this new pair was produced by the downtown Richmond pair in 2003, at their original nest site on the BB&T building.

Another Richmond offspring, hatched at Riverfront Plaza in 2006 and then moved to Shenandoah National Park where she was hacked on Hawksbill Mountain, was just discovered nesting in the understructure of a concrete bridge that carries PA Route 472 across the Susquehanna River, between Columbia and Wrightsville in Lancaster County, PA.
These are great examples of the importance of banding these chicks. Not only do we learn more about these birds’ survival and dispersal, but such events underscore the contribution of our Richmond peregrines to falcon restoration in the Appalachians and along the Atlantic coast.

Since the high risk nest site on the BBT building was blocked by DGIF Nongame biologists in March, the whereabouts of the Richmond falcon pair has been in question. The birds continued to be seen on several of their favored perches. For some time only a single bird was being seen at one time making us wonder if the birds hadn't in fact found an alternate nest site. A number of possible sites have been evaluated by DGIF Nongame biologists but no nest site was confirmed.


Today both birds were seen for some time spending much of the afternoon perched on the BBT building across from the nestbox at Riverfront Plaza. Given the length of time the pair were both present it is unlikely that the pair currently have an active nest. We will continue to monitor the pair and attempt to identify any potential nest sites.

The 2009 breeding season begins with some uncertainty regarding where the downtown Richmond falcons intend to nest. DGIF and our partners have been monitoring the falcons’ activities via the Richmond Falcon Cam. So far the birds have paid little attention to the nest box on the West Tower at Riverfront Plaza, and have instead focused on their old nest site at the BB&T building. On March 20th, a DGIF biologist accessed the BB&T balcony ledge to determine whether any eggs had been laid, and found that none had been. He then used bricks and cinderblocks to minimize nesting opportunities at that site. The decision to discourage the falcons from nesting on the BB&T ledge was based on the challenges and risks posed by that site.

After the Richmond falcons were first documented as a pair in 2002, they nested on the BB&T building in 2003 through 2005. They moved to an existing nest box on the nearby West Tower of the Riverfront Plaza in 2006, and nested there again in 2007 and 2008. Following the pair’s move to Riverfront Plaza, DGIF personnel covered the nest platform on the BB&T building ledge with a slanted board, to discourage the birds from nesting there again. The narrow ledge provides little room for the chicks to move about and exercise as they grow, increasing likelihood of their jumping or falling from the ledge before they can fly, as was experienced in 2003. "Penning" and soft release of the chicks from the BB&T site, as was accomplished in 2004 and 2005, requires construction of a pen on the roof of the building, and stressful (for the chicks and parents) relocation of the chicks to the rooftop during banding. Furthermore, nest and camera management by biologists at that site is difficult and unsafe because of the small space on which the nesting platform is built. The site is only accessible through a window, which further exposes biologists to attack by the adult birds.

It is our hope that the pair will refocus its attention on the Riverfront Plaza site, and that we may continue to broadcast their breeding activities via the Richmond Falcon Cam. We will continue to monitor the pair and to provide updates as events unfold.


UPDATE AT THE BREAKS!

On an upbeat note, today we received confirmation of a pair of peregrines at Breaks Interstate Park, on the Kentucky-Virginia border near Haysi, VA. In partnership with the Park staff, we have conducted hacks of Virginia-produced juvenile falcons at the Park during the last two summers (including 2 chicks of the Richmond pair in 2007), in hopes of establishing a resident pair. We will provide updates on the “Breaks” pair as the season progresses.

Following the failure of the 2008 falcon brood, DGIF biologists continued to monitor the nest site through the Falcon Cam in the hopes of documenting a renesting attempt by the pair. Although the falcons were occasionally seen on camera, they did not renest at the site. Throughout the summer and fall the falcons continued to be seen sporadically. This pair does not seem to be migratory, although they may wander over a much larger area during the non-breeding season.

The Falcon Cam has been broadcasting intermittently over the past several months as we have attempted to troubleshoot network and equipment issues. On Thursday, November 20th DGIF staff were able to restore full functionality to the camera. The decision has been made to leave the feed active at this time as a service for Falcon Cam watchers who enjoy viewing the nest site outside of the falcons’ breeding season. Please note, however, that this blog WILL NOT be regularly updated until we are closer to the breeding season. In addition, any network outages/equipment issues that may affect the Falcon Cam will be dealt with as staff schedules permit.

NEWS from 2008

DGIF biologists were able to recover only a few egg shell fragments following the falcons’ removal of their final egg from the nest site, which marked the failure of their 2008 brood. These fragments were submitted to the Southeastern Cooperative Wildlife Disease Study lab at the University of Georgia for testing. As there were no tissues contained within these fragments, the testing was limited to heavy metal screening. Iron, Manganese, Zinc and Copper were all detected at levels well within normal limits. No other metals were detected by the screening. At this time the factors that contributed to the nest failure are still unknown.

At the time of the nest failure, the gravel present in the nest box had been used by the falcons as a scrape for multiple successful broods with no apparent ill effect. Although there were no indications that any contaminant was present, we replaced the gravel with fresh gravel as a precautionary measure

We are aware of the camera outage and a working to trace its source.

Although both birds were somewhat defensive of the site when DGIF biologists accessed the ledge to clean and modify the nest box, they have not been seen on camera recently. We will hopefully resolve the camera issue soon and continue to monitor the site.

Since the last update both of the remaining eggs have been lost. By about 5:30pm yesterday the 3rd egg had been removed from the nest by the falcons. The fourth remained and appeared to have pipped. The female settled down to incubate the egg overnight and we were hopeful that the remaining egg might still be viable.

As of about 6:15 am this morning the fourth egg had also been removed. We are unsure what may have led to the failure of this clutch. There are many plausible causes and we simply don't have enough information at this point to speculate. This morning eggshell fragments and a sample of the gravel from the scrape were retrieved for lab analysis.

We will continue to monitor and evaluate the nest site. There is still the possibility that the falcons will have second brood. We will update you as information becomes available.

We are aware of the unfortunate happening at the nest in Richmond. At this point it appears that we lost two of our young birds. One was noted dead this morning and a second egg appeared to be hatching. This second egg was then carried off by the female.

As of this posting it appears that a third egg is in the process of hatching.

At this point we are unsure of what exactly has happened. We do not wish to engage in speculation, any number of scenarios are possible. We are consulting with our project partners and will post further updates as soon as we are able.

At least one of the eggs has hatched and second has pipped. The 1st egg hatched at about 6:30pm, and a good sized hole was seen in a second egg at 8:05pm. Pipping is the process by which the chick begins to pecks a hole in the egg. By tomorrow morning we should have at least two falcon chicks, called eyases. The female is keeping both the new hatcling and the remianing eggs well protected. Note the empty eggshell in this photo!

We continue to watch and wait for the first hatching. The female seems to be a bit fidgety over the last day or so, checking and rearranging the eggs frequently. Our initial estimate of April 21st for a hatch date was obviously a bit early. Incubation of this clutch began later in the hatching cycle, resulting in a later hatch date.

We are monitoring the camera regularly and will post any updates as quickly as possible

Those who liked to peek in on the falcons at night were long able to take advantage of the buildings lighting to keep an eye on the birds. A problem with the lighting has darkened the ledge at night. We can see a flickering bulb on camera, but at this critical stage we are unable to do any maintenance on the ledge.

We have a further difficulty in the early morning when strong light from the rising sun illuminates every smudge and scratch in the camera dome, confusing the autofocus feature of the camera which confuses this glare with a close object. A camera operator is not always available to correct this issue but we are trying to ensure that we refocus the camera as quickly as possible.

We are drawing close to hatching for our eggs! Falcon incubation averages about 33 days. Calculating the date of the first hatching can be tricky however as the birds don't really start to incubate in earnest until the second egg is laid (even later if the weather is quite warm). The purpose of this is to minimize the size difference between siblings, preventing the youngest from being at too great a competitive disadvantage.

The falcon egg prognosticator calculates that the 1st egg will hatch on April 21st or 22nd, this is approximately 35 days from the date the egg was laid.

Required electrical work at the site resulted tin damage to piece of the falcon cam's network infrastructure. This has been replaced and the cam is fully operational

We are aware of the outage and are working to correct it. Hopefully the cam will be back online soon.

The Richmond peregrine falcons have four eggs! In all likelihood we won't see any more eggs. although very rarely more then 4 will be laid. Finding room to incubate all four was a bit tricky!

Sometime in the afternoon of March 22nd the third egg was laid. We'll keep watching to see if a fourth egg is in the works.

Sometime between 11pm on March 19th and 7 am on the 20th the Richmond peregrine falcons laid their second egg. We'll keep watching to see how many eggs form this year's clutch

After much anticipation the Richmond Peregrine Falcons have their first egg as of about 5:10pm. The female spent most of the previous evening raising hopes that egg laying would be imminent.

More eggs are likely imminent as the pair continue to breed. You'll notice that the egg is not being continually incubated. This is not a cause for alarm. Incubation is often delayed until the last egg is laid. This may be a strategy to reduce the time between hatching for the eggs. Eggs are incubated, on average, for 33 days. Four eggs is a typical clutch, although 5 or even 6 occurs rarely.

For more 1st egg action be sure to check out the Norfolk Botanical Garden Eagle Cam - where the 1st egg of a replacement clutch was laid on Sunday.

Following some extreme weather in the Richmond area last night (high winds, heavy rains and lightning). The Falcon Cam has lost some of its functionality today. While the image is still being fed, many camera controls are unavailable. You may notice intermittent outages today as we attempt to restore camera function.

One of the falcons was seen at the box briefly this morning.

Enjoy this short clip of the female feeding and then flying in to the ledge for a close up

The young Richmond falcon that had been rehabbing with Tri-County rehabilitation (band 49-Z) has been released. Although the bird had recovered nicely it still seemed to favor its right wing.


She was placed with a Falconer, a technique that allowed her to self-regulate the amount of exercise she was capable of. In essence the bird was able to determine when it was ready for release. On Wednesday Feb 27th, She did just that, taking off for an exercise flight and not returning. Our thanks to Tri-county for a great job

The Richmond FalconCam is live for 2008! Both parents have been noted in the area lately with the female seen utilizing favorite perch on the BBT building. In Virginia, Peregrine Falcons typically lay eggs in March or April. Cam viewers may recall that last year's nesting attempt was fairly late, with the parents starting (and abandoning) a nest site at the James River Bridge prior to settling back into this site.