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Peregrine falcons, once extremely endangered, now stable in Iowa skies
Falconers and researchers have worked together to restore their populations throughout the Midwest.
Aug. 27, 2023 5:30 am, Updated: Aug. 27, 2023 10:16 am
This is the seventh and final installment of Nature’s Alarm, a series about endangered and threatened species and research in Iowa.
A small silhouette dotted the sky in Waverly in 2003. If you squinted at it, you might’ve been able to make out pointed wings backlit by the sun, powerfully commanding the air with strong pumps. It hovered over a waterway and cast a shadow atop some pheasants scattered there.
Richard Woods patiently watched the scene from the ground. He startled the pheasants, causing them to take flight — and then, the hunt was on for his peregrine falcon flying above.
The raptor folded its wings and dropped hundreds of feet in seconds. It zeroed in on a pheasant and swiftly knocked into it midair. The stunned prey bounced onto the roadway below, where about a dozen observers with the North American Falconers Association watched in awe.
“Falconry is one of those sports where you can have the highest high or the lowest low, depending on how things go,” Woods said as he recounted the chase. “That was a really (high) day.”
With a blow of his whistle and a swing of his lure, Woods summoned his peregrine falcon back to his gloved hand, ending the demonstration. He bred his first peregrine in 1992. At the time, he was the only licensed raptor breeder in Iowa. Now 71, he owns four pairs of peregrines and has bred and sold hundreds more.
Falconers train birds of prey to hunt wild animals. But years ago, they were not allowed to own peregrine falcons in the U.S. The once widespread species was nearly eradicated from North America in the 20th century, reduced to just 39 pairs in the lower 48 states by 1979. Two subspecies were listed as federally endangered in 1970 before today’s Endangered Species Act even existed.
More than 50 years later, peregrine falcon populations are flourishing across the U.S. Even though they’re still listed as a species of special concern in Iowa, their local populations are stable. Their profound resurgence arose from decades of collaboration between falconers and researchers, two groups working toward the same goal: to save the species.
“If you want a success story, they are truly a success story,” said Amy Ries of the Decorah-based Raptor Resource Project. “It's not all gloom and doom. There's not nothing that we can do.”
Decline of the bird of prey
Peregrine falcons are coated in gray-blue feathers with fine streaks across their chests. A dark hood of plumage covers their face like a mask, framing two dark eyes. Their bright yellow beaks and feet are pops of color. Their wingspans typically stretch about 3.5 feet across.
The birds of prey specialize in hunting while flying. When they spot a meal — like an injured or sick pigeon — they fold their wings in, and jet down to attack from above. Their dives can reach speeds up to 200 miles per hour. Their diets help regulate disease and injuries in their prey populations.
In Iowa, peregrine falcons historically nested on bluffs along the Mississippi River. They also swept through some interior cliff and river systems like those in Linn and Johnson counties. Some individuals migrated; others stayed put year-round. That all changed with one pesticide.
Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane, commonly known as DDT, was a popular pesticide developed in the 1940s. Contaminated insects would be ingested by smaller birds, which birds of prey would eat — amplifying DDT’s harmful impacts. It diminished bird fertility and made egg shells so fragile, they would break.
As a result, successful reproduction of raptors plummeted. The falcon maintained its endangered listing when the Endangered Species Act was adopted in 1973. The last peregrine falcon documented in Iowa was spotted in 1956.
“Any birds that perished were never replaced,” said Anna Buckardt Thomas, an Iowa Department of Natural Resources avian ecologist. “The population was decimated.”
Falconers lead the way
Woods and his wife went on their honeymoon in 1975, hopping between national parks in the West. He was introduced to William Burnham in Colorado, who established a peregrine breeding facility there. Burnham would later become president of the Peregrine Fund, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting raptors.
Woods learned about the breeding operation — and he was intrigued. A decade later, he became involved with peregrine breeding efforts in Minnesota. And, by the 1990s, he was the first to successfully breed one of the endangered subspecies of peregrine falcons in Iowa.
Woods now houses each of his breeding pairs in its own chamber on his property in Independence. The small buildings offer 200 square feet of privacy and freedom for each duo. This year, one pair raised a baby that Wood is now training for a new owner.
“Us guys that do it kind of consider it almost an addiction,” he said about falconry with a chuckle. “Once you get started, how do you stop?”
Falconry has persisted for thousands of years, and peregrine falcons have long been considered the “gold standard” bird choice, Woods said.
Starting in 1970, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prohibited falconers from training wild peregrine falcons while their populations recovered. Falconers challenged the ruling, arguing that breeding the species in captivity wouldn’t harm wild populations. Limited take of young falcons in the West was permitted starting in 2000, expanding to include falcons in the eastern U.S. by 2008.
Now, there’s a federal and state permitting system that allows peregrine falcons and other raptors to be captured and raised for falconry. Falconers traditionally did so using a process called hacking, which was perfected over centuries of the sport.
Young falcons — no older than a month or so — were taken from their nests and transported to an artificial nesting tower. Falconers would feed the birds there until they started flying and showing signs they were ready to hunt. Then, the training would begin.
“Falconers were the first ones to captively breed them,” Woods said. “It wasn't some zoo, and it wasn't the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.”
Learning from the experts
Many bird species took major hits from DDT. Some, like the bald eagle, naturally rebounded after the pesticide’s ban in 1972. Peregrine falcon populations required a more hands-on reintroduction approach — one that evolved from falconry practices.
Captive falcons would raise their babies until they were ready to fledge, or leave the nests. Then, researchers would transfer the young birds to temporary cages — called hack boxes — at hopeful nesting sites in the wild. These sites could be atop tall buildings, energy plant smokestacks or cliffs. The birds would be fed and learn to fly in their enclosures. And then, when they were old enough to hunt by themselves, they were released into the wild.
“That was a way to get the birds to imprint on those areas,” Buckardt Thomas said. “Hopefully, when they were adults, they would come back to breed.”
The Iowa DNR’s peregrine falcon restoration program began in 1989. The first 23 birds were released in Cedar Rapids in 1991, making the metro the first in the state to have nesting pairs.
David Conrads, now the founder and director of UI’s Wildlife Instruction and Leadership Development, was one of the Iowa DNR’s two hack site attendants who oversaw the state’s reintroduction of peregrine falcons. He recounted watching young birds in a Cedar Rapids hack box from a distance, monitoring them grow into adults.
“It was just amazing to just have that literally bird's eye view of an endangered species develop right before your eyes,” he said.
Nineteen more falcons were released in Des Moines that same year. In 1999, a pair of peregrine falcons nested on the historic nesting grounds along the Mississippi River bluffs for the first time in decades. By 2003, 169 captively reared birds were released in Iowa, and 875 birds were released across the Midwest.
More than 6,000 American peregrine falcons have been released in North America since 1974. The species was officially de-listed as endangered in 1999, although it’s still federally protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
The nationwide reintroduction efforts wouldn’t have been possible without the expertise and direct contributions of falconers. Woods gave two of his own young birds to a falcon pair nesting in Cedar Rapids when their own brood failed.
“The falconry community was actually really key,” Buckardt Thomas said. “It was really a big effort by falconers and biologists combined to be able to have the population that we’re up to today.”
As of 2022, there were 20 active nests known in Iowa. Iowa DNR staffers and volunteers monitor them every breeding season to document their activity, number of eggs and survival rates. At least 21 peregrine falcons fledged from their nests last year.
Nest numbers in the state have been stable for the last decade. “The population actually is quite robust, which is just great news,” Ries said.
Further research on expanding population
A large mist net stretched across a site in Johnson County, secured in front of lure. Blinds around the trap shielded researchers and other onlookers from sight.
It was a peculiar setup. But, from hundreds of feet above, where peregrine falcons may be flying, it might’ve looked enticing. The birds wouldn’t see the net as they dove toward the lure, becoming entangled in the strings. And then the researchers could emerge, safely remove the falcon and study their subject.
“Once you have lured a hawk out of the sky and you hold it in your arms and you smell it's yeasty breath … it's just exciting to be able to be that close to the wild,” Conrads said.
Now that peregrine falcon populations are finally stable, researchers have more subjects to study — and they can learn how to help them even more.
The UI Iowa Raptor Project, for instance, started in 1985 to rehab birds of prey. Conrads, who has a graduate degree in raptor biology, was hired as director in 1990. He injected more research into the mix, studying hawk migration in the Iowa River Valley from the early 1990s until 2000.
This fall is the project’s first year back trapping and banding hawks as they migrate through the river valley. The method Conrads demonstrated to onlookers has landed him two peregrine falcons in the past.
The Raptor Resource Project also runs a banding program. The organization was founded in 1988 to breed peregrine falcons in Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin, and it worked with the Iowa DNR to release falcons in their historic habitats along bluffs. The team banded 81 birds this year.
The researchers also started a new project: They collected blood samples from about 20 birds in Iowa as they banded them. The Iowa DNR is analyzing the samples to learn more about highly pathogenic avian influenza in wild bird populations. The virus is known for decimating commercial bird flocks, but little is known about its impacts to wild birds in Iowa.
Although they’re finally stable, peregrine falcons aren’t free from threats. Raptor Resource Project has documented changing migration and reproductive patterns of peregrine falcons. Ries guesses it’s due to climate change. Warmer springs summon the falcons back to their breeding grounds earlier than usual.
Today’s continued research — resting on the back of thousands of years of falconer traditions — can help ensure the peregrine falcon stays abundant in Iowan ecosystems and beyond.
“We're to the point now where they have de-listed (peregrine falcons),” Woods said. “But the next step now is basically making them like every other kind of wild hawk, where you no longer have to worry about them disappearing.”
How we reported this series
Nature’s Alarm started as a question this spring: On the 50th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act, what do we know about threatened and endangered species in Iowa? Can we highlight some of these species and the researchers studying them?
Members of The Gazette’s newsroom have spent the last four months planning and reporting this series, which began July 16 and has been published weekly.
Reporter Brittney J. Miller started with background interviews in search of active research occurring for at-risk species in Iowa. Once she identified target species — each representing a different fauna group — she coordinated with researchers to accompany them into the field with photojournalists Jim Slosiarek and Geoff Stellfox, and social video producer Bailey Cichon. Digital editor John McGlothlen built graphics to accompany the stories online.
The Gazette team clambered through vegetation in search of bumblebees, worked by the light of headlamps to spot bats, and floated along rivers to catch a glimpse of fish, amphibians and mussels to report this series.
Brittney J. Miller is the Energy & Environment Reporter for The Gazette and a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues.
Comments: (319) 398-8370; brittney.miller@thegazette.com
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