Nature! It's still happening around us despite the mess that humans have made of their world. And once again I'd like to point you to the meditative live peregrine falcon cam atop PG&E's Beale Street building, where exciting things may be about to happen.

The female peregrine falcon, named Val by falcon watchers, first laid several eggs back in late March, and none of those appear to have hatched. But in the meantime, she has laid at least three more, which she has been brooding for over a month now. There's a message board where the falcon obsessed have been discussing this and comparing notes about what they see — basically, Val has been visited and helped by a young male that's been named Canyon in recent weeks who has stepped in since the father, Dan, took off.

Canyon was seen mating with Val at least once, and he may be the father of the second clutch of eggs. But in any case, he's now bringing Val food on occasion.

"No one saw what happened to Dan," writes forum moderator Barbara. "He was there one day and gone the next. Unmated birds are called 'floaters' and they often move in if something happens to one of the pair during nesting season." She surmises that Dan might have been an older bird, and he perhaps lost out in competition with the younger Canyon.

In any event, Val is now dutifully brooding seven eggs, only three of which may be viable, and Barbara had predicted that June 5 would be the hatch date — based on the 33-day average incubation for a clutch of eggs. That day has come and gone, and the eggs haven't hatched, but the watchers on the message board are holding out hope.

The seven eggs, with one off to the side that has long since calcified.

Val can be seen pushing the eggs under her and then sleepily sitting there on them, day and night, with occasional breaks.

SFist first covered the falcon cam back in 2011, and the camera itself has gotten a major upgrade since then. Usually we would have been seeing eggs hatching in March, but something was amiss with that first clutch, and here we are waiting again.

Back in 2018, only one out of three hatchlings survived, and in 2019, two out of three made it into adulthood. Hopefully, we'll have some little fluffballs to watch getting fed in the next few weeks, and then flying lessons will start happening before long in July!

Previously: Moment of Zen: The Peregrine Falcon Cam Atop the PG&E Building