Thread: falcon having a go

They're an interesting bird, when my son's dove got hammered I stepped off the verandah to where it was lying, the falcon had disappeared. Picking it up I was startled by a movement just a few feet away, and bugger me dead - there was the falcon (young male) three feet away totally blending into the background.
"He wants that dove, I think I'll let him have it."
"What are you thinking, that's your sons pet."
"It's dead."

And when I plucked the female off the cage wires it was still snapping at the budgies and seemed completely oblivious to the fact it was being manhandled - then it relaxed and studied me until I got it in the box. It did the same when the crew from Wingspan arrived and took her out for a nosey, she seemed quite unconcerned.

We've had a few here as we have outside aviaries and the sparrows gather in the akeake trees waiting for the birds to be fed, the missus throws yesterdays husks on the ground - and they swoop in. At the end of the akeake trees is a bushy pittosporum hedge and I was sitting watching the midday news when that hedge shimmered all along its length as the sparrows hit it and disappeared.
I'd never seen that before and immediately thought 'falcon' - and sure enough there was one sitting on the garage roof looking at the doves, and she swooped. It didn't take her long to realise there was no free lunch there and she disappeared - but it was those sparrows hitting the hedge that I remember, they didn't muck around.