New Hampshire Peregrine Recovery Turns 40!
Article by Chris Martin
Photos right:
Top: The female Peregrine Falcon whose satellite transmitter has been working since 2014, “Black/green A/G” was photographed in Boscawen by Todd Quinn on 10-4-20.
Both photos below: Chris Martin releasing one of the Peregrine Falcon fledglings from the I-293 bridge after being rehabilitated. Photos by Grace Preston, 6-16-20.
Spring 2020 marked the 40th consecutive year of Peregrine Falcon breeding season monitoring and management in New Hampshire in the post-DDT recovery era. Currently listed as state-threatened, New Hampshire’s Peregrine breeding population continues its very gradual rebound. NH Audubon staff and volunteer observers confirmed 24 territorial pairs in 2020, the same number as found in 2019. We confirmed 21 incubating pairs, and 16 successful pairs that fledged at least one young each. A total of 36 young fledged statewide, second only to the record-high 43 fledged in 2018.
Roughly 25% of New Hampshire’s Peregrine pairs now nest on human-created structures, including on buildings, bridges, stacks, and quarries. Construction projects at two New Hampshire bridges where Peregrines live continued to occupy our management focus during 2020. At the I-293/101 Bridge in Bedford/Manchester, a pair successfully raised two young on a New Hampshire Department of Transportation (DOT)-installed nest tray, although one fledgling had to spend three days in rehabilitation at Wings of the Dawn in Henniker before being banded and returned to her parents. We also collaborated with Maine DOT at the I-95 Piscataqua River Bridge in Portsmouth/Kittery, where a pair incubated eggs unsuccessfully inside a bridge beam located directly above a busy construction yard on the Maine shore.
Our last remaining transmittered falcon – fitted with her 12-gram solar-powered device back in May 2014 during our partnership with Biodiversity Research Institute (BRI) and Stantec – continues to send us her locations on an intermittent basis. After nesting at Bear Mountain in Hebron in 2014-17, “Black/green A/G” has been at Holts Ledge in Lyme for each of the past three breeding seasons. She typically spends her winters in southeastern Pennsylvania, but in early October she stopped off in Boscawen for a photo (see photo by Todd Quinn)!
More than two months after fledging in June from the Brady Sullivan Tower in Manchester, one of this season’s juveniles returned to the nest box while both parents were dozing, and this triggered quite an interaction which was captured on video thanks to our friends at Peregrine Networks (formerly Genuity Networks) and one of our more fanatic Peregrine-watchers. For several minutes, “Black/green 90/BU” and his parents engaged in a somewhat conflicted mix of both territorial defense and family bonding … fascinating to watch! See for yourself at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyuTl4WlabA.
NH Audubon conducts Peregrine Falcon monitoring and management in New Hampshire in partnership with the NH Fish and Game Department’s Nongame Wildlife Program, which provides funding for our breeding site management through the federal State Wildlife Grant (SWG) program.
NH Audubon received a grant from the Dorr Foundation for a new Peregrine Falcon education initiative. Our biologists and educators worked with Hooksett Memorial School 5th graders to develop and test a new Peregrine Falcon curriculum. You can see one of our Peregrine webinars with Hooksett students at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQe6bBovCvE&t=21s.
A big “Thank You!” to all our partners, individual donors, private landowners, rock climbers, and field volunteers.
Photo below: Students from Hooksett Memorial School (HMS) started their five-month learning journey in February 2020 focused on scientific observation of the resident Peregrine Falcon family by hearing from Chris Martin and education staff in the 2020 pilot project, Learning as Scientists: Students Monitoring Peregrine Falcons in Manchester. Teachers from HMS have partnered with NH Audubon again in 2021 to offer this unique curriculum. Photo by Dyanna Smith.
