A peregrine falcon chick's "bucket list"

     The four peregrine falcon chicks being raised atop Greysolon Plaza in downtown Duluth should fledge -- begin to fly -- about July 1, said Julie O'Connor with Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory.

O'Connor and other naturalists are working Tuesdays through Saturdays at Lake Place Park along Duluth's Lakewalk to let visitors watch the adult and recently hatched falcons in their nest box. Peregrine Watch goes from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. those days.

Julie and HRBO sidekick Debbie Waters have come up with at list of things peregrine falcon chicks atop Greysolon must do before flying. Sort of a bucket list for baby falcons. Here it is:

1. Get hatched

2. Be able to hold your head up

3. Open wings without falling over

4. Grow feathers and pull out itchy white down

5. Tear up your own food (rather than having adults do it)

6. Realize there's a world outside the nest box. ("This is called 'thinking outside the box,'" O'Connor said.

7. Walk around inside the box

8. Flap wings inside the box

9. Practice gripping the lip of nest box and balancing on it

10. Open wings on lip of box

11. Flap wings on lip of box

12. Step out onto perches that extend beyond box

13. Repeat steps 9-11 on perches

14. Hop back and forth from perch to perch

15. Practice landing and balancing on perch

16. Practice "soaring" by opening wings and feeling the updraft of wind to learn what wind in your wings feels like.

17. Let go of perch, sometimes with one foot, finally with two -- flight.

     Now,they're somewhere between tearing up their own food and stepping up to the lip of the box, O'Connor said. The adults are flying back and forth in front of the box in an effort to help the chicks achieve Step 6 (above), thinking outside the box.

Posted by: samcook on 6/23/2009 at 12:06 PM | Comments (1) | Permalink