SKOL: Falcons have made an amazing comeback

[Donna]

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Bob Anderson’s voice conveyed excitement that an eagle had just come to a nest being monitored by a Web camera in Decorah, Iowa. I was on the Raptorresrouce.org Web site as I talked with him on the telephone.

“Hit ‘What’s New’ and I’ll guide you to it,� he said. I followed his instructions and arrived at the “Web cam� scene in time to view the white-headed, mature eagle sitting on the nest. The breeding season is later in winter, but a pair has been photographed at the nest. ‘That’s a trout stream you can hear in the background,� he added.

I called Anderson, who had spoken to the Mississippi Valley Conservancy annual banquet the night before, to find out how old he is. He’s sturdily built, with gray hair and beard — a commanding, rugged presence in sport coat and jeans even without a peregrine falcon perched on his gloved hand.

As executive director of the Raptor Resource Project, Anderson, 58, rappels down cliff faces and climbs power plant smoke stacks to monitor peregrine nests and band the young, all the while risking a whack from a protective peregrine parent. And quite a whack it might be since peregrines have been clocked at well over 200 mph as they dive on prey.

The banding is part of Anderson’s efforts to track the successful return of the falcons to their natural nesting sites on the bluffs after the birds were nearly exterminated in North America in the mid-1900s due to the use of the pesticide DDT.

Before the recovery efforts by Anderson and others after the ban on DDT, the last chicks were found at Maiden Rock in 1962. Nest boxes on power plant smoke stacks and city buildings helped start the recovery. Now the birds have returned to their historic cliff nest sites up and down the river.

Anderson told members of MVC, which has had some success protecting the bluffs the peregrines use, that they should drive along the river in April to enjoy the spectacle of the peregrines claiming and protecting their nesting sites. He advises watching for the peregrines battling other raptors, such as eagles and red-tailed hawks. They won’t tolerate other raptors in their territory and have been known to knock an eagle out of the sky, he said.

The other spectacle Anderson promised is live views of nest sites through the cameras that have been placed not just in peregrine nest sites, but those of other raptors, such as the newly installed eagle nest camera. As the breeding season approaches a schedule of nest viewing cameras will be posted on the Web site. Eventually, some of the nests will be equipped with night vision technology. All of this is available through the raptorresource.org site, including access to photos taken during the installation of the eagle cam in mid-November.

The mission of the Raptor Resource Project is to preserve and strengthen raptor populations, to expand participation in raptor preservation and to help foster the next generation of preservationists.

That’s right in line with other conservation organizations, including the MVC — building awareness that individuals and groups can make a difference in conservation.

And one way to do that, Anderson advised, is to “celebrate our successes.�

So as MVC members celebrated their success in protecting bluffs, they joined Anderson in celebrating one of the most remarkable success stories in wildlife conservation — the return of the peregrines to those beautiful Mississippi bluffs.