This is amazing. It sounds like this could be an adaptation particular to them, too? The long list of adaptations they possess and their ability to hunt so many different kinds of prey in all seasons and habitats are enabling their successful return here, despite the rough first-year mortality.
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Apparently, yet It looks like the sclerotic ring is not confined to just falcons:
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Anyone else have peregrine falcon envy?
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It is – if you can veer back up. Otherwise it’s simply called terminal velocity.
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“By 1970, California’s peregrine population had dwindled to only two known nesting pairs statewide. The federal government banned DDT in 1972. And successful restoration efforts spearheaded by organizations like The Peregrine Fund helped revive their numbers.”
Thankfully no Fox News in those days to defend noble DDT titans against Chinese extinction hoaxers.
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I spent a lot of time on a ridgetop migratory Golden Eagle count. Smaller raptors took the same route, and we would often see them “take a shot” at the slower eagles. They were not expecting to take down the eagles, and it was not territorial, since they were migrating. Just orneryness, I guess.
But then we would often see different species travelling together, one time there were 7 species.
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They would probably be a more effective defense against aggressive shore birds - pigeons can be pests in those areas, too…
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To peregrinate, or peregrinations.
Peregrines are one raptor that’s doing fairly well here in the UK, they’ve learned to use the urban landscape for nesting purposes, ie church towers and spires, office blocks, warehousing, etc. A pair have been nesting for years on the tower of a church in the city of Bath, I’ve watched one perched on a stone finial, plucking the feathers from a hapless pigeon, I’ve watched a pair on the ground in a field one winter, probably looking for earthworms, just outside a local village, and just recently a pair, possibly a parent and one of this year’s fledglings, flying over where I work, on a large business estate in Westbury, which isn’t all that far from Bath, so it’s entirely possible that I’ve seen the offspring of the Bath pair.
I was actually watching a peregrine being put through it’s paces by a falconer at a zoo just outside of Bristol today, stunning bird close up; she was a bit slow, and not very interested, because she nailed a pigeon yesterday, and was more than a little overweight!
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Team Goshawk here
This one also has a cool bit on Peregrine Falcons. Goshawk starts at 1.43.
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That’s like me around pizza. 
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I’ve never seen feathers offered as a pizza topping. Is it in the “extra special toppings = +$2.99” list? Because I don’t look that far down the menu.
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Oh, haha, I meant ME. Around pizza, I stuff myself so much and then POOF I turn into a cloud of feathers.
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