Peregrines over Port Stephens

Wednesday I joined the wife on a walk to celebrate her birthday. The destination was Tomaree Head near Shoal Bay and the climb to the lookout. The weather was quite warm (about 30 degrees celcius) with a gusty NE wind of up to 60kms per hour blowing across the summit. While not a big hill the summit is 168m above sea level and a great place to look for birds.

This day proved to be more of a treat for me than my wife as we discovered a family of Peregrine Falcons living on the hill. The chick/s had fledged and were flying well as the family of 3 zoomed across across the sky, and rode the winds both above and below our location.

At times we watched what appeared to be hunting training as the youngsters rode the winds to great heights then flipped inverted and began their trademark dives...towards their parent! At the last moment both birds would radically change direction to avoid impact. How they knew which way to turn without crashing into each other was obviously instictive or good communication (didn't look like just good luck).

It was great to watch but tough to photograph as they were so fast, and I was trying to hold the lens on them with a stiff headwind blowing me off balance and also shooting into the sun. Anyway I hope you enjoy the pics I did manage to get :)