Monday, January 04, 2016

Welcome to 2016!

As is the tradition with the new year, it is time to summarize 2015 and look forward to 2016!  Both Durand and Spark have been seen on and off at the nest site most of the fall and early winter.  Here are both on the ledge early in 2016:
Columbus has had some extremely mild weather most of this winter--so far.  Mild conditions means the birds don't have to focus so much on basic survival which gave them some time for a  little bonding in the nestbox.  They won't get too serious though until later in February, when courtship will ramp up.  Eggs are typically laid in March.  That's a current look, so now to reflect on 2015:
2015 was similar to the year before with 4 eggs laid and 3 hatched.  Two of the fledglings did well.  Unfortunately, the third young falcon did not successfully fly and is now a permanent educational ambassador at the Glen Helen Raptor Center.  
Blog traffic was pretty similar to last year as well.  Here's the breakdown of the Columbus Peregrine FalconCam Blog statistics from January 1, 2015 - December 31, 2015:
Total number of visits - 183,574
Number of unique visitors - 39,325
The highest traffic day was Tuesday, April 28 with 3,688 hits.  This was when the 3rd egg hatched.
Visits came from 71 countries/territories with Ohioans making up about 83% of the audience.
As always - a VERY BIG THANK YOU to each and every fan out there!