Greetings, Tweets.

The Tacoma peregrines' love lives have been confusing for the past couple
of weeks. But just this morning I saw a hopeful sign.

Sash, the female who had shown up here on January 25, disappeared almost
three weeks ago on Feb. 15. Sash never seemed receptive to mating.

A few days later, on Feb. 18, a new fully adult female arrived (she is
not banded) and started keeping company with the male. Then for most of
this week I could not find her--until day. (I assume that today's adult
female is the same one.)

This morning I watched the female take off from the bridge to chase off a
third peregrine that was flying out over the Tacoma tideflats. The male
trailed after. (The intruder was far enough off that I couldn't tell from
its size whether it was male or female.)

Shortly after the chase while the female was resting on the Washington
Buidling, the male flew to her, she leaned forward, and they
copulated--apparently satisfactorily.

That's the first copulation I've seen this spring, and I'll take it as a
sign of hope.

Now I'll get my Tacoma peregrine web page up to date.

--Jim Lyles, Tacoma
<http://www.nwrain.com/~jrlyles/Tacoma_Peregrines.html>