My wife and I were driving on Highway 60 about 6 kilometres west of Barry's Bay yesterday Oct 3rd. There is a sanitary landfill there. As we approached the entrance we noticed birds (mostly gulls and crows) seemed to be flying everyway. Suddenly two birds spiralled down to the ground locked in a struggle. They broke apart and one, a juvenile herring gull, took off and the other, a raptor, took off after it. The raptor quickly caught the gull in the air and they crashed again to the ground this time at the edge of the other side of the road at the landfill entrance.
They continued to struggle on the ground for 7 long minutes as vehicles drove past. It took me several minutes to realise that the raptor was a juvenile peregrine falcon. Even though it appeared that the gull had lost the fight, eventually the Peregrine left the gull and flew up and perched on the landfill fence before flying into the woods. I purposely did not interfere with the scene as it unfolded. I thought that the Peregrine may come back to claim its prey. You can view an image here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/38402205@N06/30078030556/in/dateposted-public/ Good birding! Stephen Stephen J Stephen Please visit my web site www.stephenjstephen.com _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists (OFO) - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to [email protected] For information about ONTBIRDS including how to unsubscribe visit http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdssetup Posting guidelines can be found at http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdsguide Visit the OFO Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/OntarioFieldOrnithologists
