Just days before five eggs are expected to hatch on the Rachel Carson State Office Building in Harrisburg, the Department of Environmental Protection this week unveiled a new and improved Peregrine Falcon webpage to enhance visitors’ online experience.

“With its streamlined navigation and easy access to the live video feed of the falcons, this new site greatly improves the educational experience for our viewers,” said DEP Director of Environmental Education Jack Farster. “Through the website, Pennsylvania has been able to share this wildlife success story with a worldwide audience.”

Visitors to the site will immediately notice the large window that provides still pictures and live video of Harrisburg’s two Peregrine falcons. The redesign also incorporates new features, such as a photo gallery featuring hundreds of spectacular images of the falcons captured throughout the years. Popular features like the Falcon Wire and history of the nesting project remain.

A separate section for educators allows teachers to register their classrooms and download falcon lesson plans. Visitors also can access archived webcasts of young falcons being banded by the Game Commission.

This year’s live Webcast will take place from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m., on May 22. By then, the five eggs the female falcon produced this year will have hatched and the nestlings will be several weeks old.

Game Commission officials will retrieve the young falcons from their nest on the 15th floor of the Rachel Carson building and take them to the auditorium where a numeric metal leg band will be attached before a live audience of central Pennsylvania students. The bands help to identify and track the birds when they leave the nest.

In addition, the falcons are weighed and examined to determine their sex, and they are checked for any health issues before they are returned to their nest.

Thirty-five teachers who attended a falcon educator workshop conducted by DEP and the Game Commission are invited to bring their students to watch the live banding in person. The students will follow the falcons’ progress online as part of their classroom activities.

In Pennsylvania, Peregrine Falcons remain an endangered species. In the early 1900s, there were about 350 nesting pairs of Peregrine Falcons in Pennsylvania. By the mid-1960s, the pesticide DDT had wiped out the Peregrines’ native breeding population in the eastern United States and records indicate the bird did not nest in Pennsylvania from about 1959 to 1987.

Thanks to recent reintroduction efforts, the number of Peregrine Falcons is slowly increasing. There are at least a dozen pairs of nesting falcons in Pennsylvania. They have adapted to life in urban environments like Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Williamsport.

Since 2000, 32 Peregrine falcons have hatched from the nest at the Rachel Carson State Office Building. Of those, 20 falcons have survived -- 11 females and 9 males.

To learn more, visit the new Falcon website.

NewsClip: 3 Peregrine Falcon Chicks Born Atop U. of Pittsburgh

5/2/2008