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Peregrine Falcon Research

SCPBRG and a large number of volunteers conduct this ongoing research effort. We continue to monitor the population; recording information on population expansion and productivity; and collecting addled eggs, blood samples, prey remains, and eggshell fragments at nest sites for pesticide and DNA analysis.

In spring of 2003 we coordinated monitoring in California for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's post-delisting monitoring for peregrines, a random sample of sites to be monitored every three years for 15 years. Limited peregrine releases still occur in areas of continued pesticide-related impacts or where breeding population expansion is incomplete. Released young are either captive-bred by associates, or salvaged from urban nest sites where fledging survival is poor and/or where removal of youngsters may lessen predation on other endangered species.

In Fall of 1998, Brian Latta SCPBRG lead field biologist coordinated the Padre Island, Texas Peregrine Falcon Survey. As a veteran of six seasons on the Survey, Brian was asked to fill in for long-time coordinator and colleague Tom Meachtle of the Boise State University Raptor Research Center while Tom and his wife Cathy were expecting their first child. Brian continues to participate in the study yearly. The Survey is sponsored by the Center for Conservation and Research Technology under a partnership that includes the University of Maryland-Baltimore Campus and BSU’s Raptor Research Center. Researchers collect information on peregrine migration, longevity, population dynamics, and many other parameters. Other organizations cooperate with this ongoing effort that includes more than three decades of work since being initiated by Grainger Hunt.

Each year hundreds of peregrines pass along these offshore barrier islands on the Texas Coast on their long-distance migration from nests in the arctic to the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central and South America. A similar, less concentrated return northward occurs and is charted by the team during April.