Lynn Barber's Birding Blog

When I woke to today’s rain on the icy streets, I decided to delay my trip north, and instead went into the “try, try again” mode with respect to finding a Peregrine Falcon in Anchorage. I tried again. I really did. But in spite of keeping today’s vow to drive around in downtown Anchorage for at least one hour, and in spite of my finally seeing pigeons downtown, I did not see any falcons. One had been seen this morning too by someone else, so I knew there was a chance, but….

I’m not sure why I have recently been so obsessed with trying to add Peregrine Falcon to my year list. I’m very, very certain that I will see one later in the year, probably without trying. When I first heard about the Peregrine Falcon downtown a couple of weeks ago, it seemed like an easy tick for my year. When I did not find it and did not even find any of its pigeon-prey, instead of making me go on to other things, I just could not shake the need to get this bird now.

Sigh. On today’s drive I went all over downtown but I repeatedly returned to survey the area around two large buildings where the falcon had been reported. Today’s efforts yielded sightings of some pigeons downtown and another large batch of them down by the Anchorage port area, in addition to the usual Black-billed Magpies and Common Ravens. The birds down by the port were skittish, making me think there was a falcon around, but although I watched them take off and land again numerous times, everything that was in the air was a pigeon. A Bald Eagle was sitting on a pole a ways off but it appeared uninterested in the pigeons’ antics.

As l left downtown at the conclusion of my searching, I was glad to see that the mountains east of Anchorage had received an additional beautiful coating of snow while we had been getting rain. It is still winter after all.