Monday, June 1, 2009

Native New Yorkers born on bridges

From the NY Times:

Five peregrine falcon chicks have been hatched in recent weeks in nests atop the towers of the Verrazano-Narrows, Throgs Neck and Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridges, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced on Thursday.

The Verrazano-Narrows falcons were two females and a male, while the Throgs Neck and Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges each had a male. The Throgs Neck chick hatched four weeks ago, and the other four hatched three weeks ago.

This week, a state volunteer wildlife expert placed metal bands around the chicks’ feet, with numbers to identify and track the birds as they grow and reproduce. Peregrine falcons are still on the state endangered species list, although they are no longer on the federal list.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sadly, none of those are "native" New Yorkers. The entire native peregrine falcon subspecies was decimated by DDT during the 1970s, and the species was re-introduced from western birds.

A great deal of work went into bringing back those fuzzy guys.

Francesca Raimond said...

I think I saw a baby falcon sitting atop a bus stop on 57th St and Lexington Ave today. It was bigger than this baby -- but pretty small. But it was perched right below the roof, and looked like it was going any time soon.

Unfortunately I didn't have my camera. Has anyone else seen this bird?