30 May 2023
Last Wednesday, 24 May, Mark Vass drove down the Monongahela River valley looking for birds and checking bridges. In West Brownsville he found a peregrine perched under the US Route 40 Lane Bane Bridge. Mark’s checklist and photo set off a quest to find the nest (https://ebird.org/checklist/S139102470)
Jeff Cieslak made the trip on Friday 26 May and found the nest hole and a pair of peregrines carrying food to it. The female is peachy with heavy dots, the male is whiter. Neither bird is banded. (My male-female assessment is based on the tendency of mid-latitude males to be paler than females. Notice that both have the adult plumage trait of horizontal stripes on their flanks.)
Alyssa Nees and Fred Kachmarik visited on Memorial Day, 29 May, and counted a family of five — two adults, three chicks. Alyssa’s photos show an adult in the nest hole …
… and a chick clearly visible (red circle) with fluffy white top of head, feathered face and brown back. The arrow points to the tail of an adult watching from above.
Fred’s photos of the chicks include an older chick and a fluffy young one:
Where are these peregrines located?
The Lane Bane Bridge, carries US Route 40 over the Monongahela River from West Brownsville, Washington County, to Brownsville, Fayette County PA. Its construction is very similar to the Graff Bridge at Kittanning, PA, which has its own nesting peregrines.
A truss structure spans the river and ends at a pillar on each side. As far as I can tell from the photos, the nest appears to be close to the pillar. So these birds are nesting in Washington County, PA.
Interestingly, when Google Street View cameras drove by on the West Brownsville side this month, the cameras “saw” a bird perched on the superstructure near the pillar. I’ll bet this dot is a peregrine.
Thanks and congratulations to Mark Vass, Jeff Cieslak, Alyssa Nees and Fred Kachmarik for finding and documenting this peregrine family.
If you’d like to see the birds yourself, Jeff provides a map.
p.s. Could there be another peregrine nest at the next bridge three miles away? Nope. The Mon-Fayette Expressway bridge is solid concrete. Click here to see a screenshot of the Mon-Fay bridge in Google Street View.
(photos by Jeff Cieslak, Mark Vass via eBird, Alyssa Nees, Fred Kachmarik via eBird, Wikimedia Commons and screenshots from Google Street View)
I was with Alyssa yesterday at the Lane Bane Bridge. I added a few more pictures to our ebird checklist if you’re interested.
Nice to see them recognized, we have been watching them for a while. The borough office is shared with the fire company building. We also have some bald eagles on the river. Not sure where the nests are but we can see them flying quite often.
Regina
West Brownsville Borough Secretary
Regina, Thank you so much for getting in touch. Peregrine fans are thrilled to learn of another nest in Southwestern PA, as you can see by the number of photos taken in the past few days. You are lucky to see them any time you step outside. Let us know how it goes when they fly.
I’ve got some pictures and video of one of the babies trying to fly-practicing. I would share, but I’m not sure how to attach it to here.
Regina, I will email you.