a Lesser Kestrel surprises a resident of Meudon-la-Forêt by perching on her balcony

Isabelle Pouliquen is still very moved and amazed when she recounts her meeting, Monday evening, with a Kestrel on the balcony of his apartment in Meudon-la-Forêt (Hauts-de-Seine).

It was his cat who sounded the alarm. At 8:15 p.m., she says that she sees her cat on her couch, on hold. He is motionless and stares at the balcony.

Isabelle, who lives in tenth and last floor of a residence of several buildings, is intrigued by the attitude of her cat. She approaches and that’s where she sees the raptor.

A Kestrel on its balcony

Isabelle’s friend, who knows the animals well, quickly identifies the Lesser Kestrel. According to its plumage, this falcon is a youngbecause it is the time when the young leave their nest, thinks the couple.

This is the first time Isabelle has seen a Lesser Kestrel perched on her balcony. With precaution, so that it does not fly away, she photographs it and makes the buzz by publishing its photos on the Internet.

A touching encounter

the bird stay half an hour on the balcony before joining pigeons on the balcony of an absent neighbour, then flying away and disappearing towards the forest.

“He had such a cute little faceremembers isabelle, a small short beak“.

“He might have been lost, if he had just left the nest“, she adds.”He was fearless, he looked me in the eye”she says with emotion in her voice.

Paris and its surroundings are said to be home to around thirty pairs of Lesser Kestrels

If an encounter on a balcony with a Kestrel is extremely rare, these falcons are very present in the sky of our region.

This raptor is one of the few to nest in Paris, in the center and in the northern periphery where there would be about thirty couples, indicates the League for the Protection of Birds.

The Kestrel is often present at the edge of highways or country roads, near grasslands which are its hunting grounds. It can also be seen in built-up areas provided that it finds small mammals there to feed on.

No bigger than a pigeon, it measures about forty centimeters. The male has a gray head and tail. Its back is russet speckled with black.

The female is a little larger than the male. She has reddish-brown plumage. Its head, its back, its tail are barred with black streaks.

The Kestrel is one of the protected animals.