Loss of habitat has led to the falcons moving into our highrises. And abundant food and safe shelter mean these urban hunters are thriving now
decimated by overuse of pesticides like DDT that weakened their eggshells. Phasing out of DDT and painstaking breeding programmes pulled them back from the brink. When populations slowly recovered, a new trend was observed in the 1990s. Peregrines began moving into cities.
Where do living beings thrive?
Wherever there is abundant food and safe shelter. The peregrines simply sought out places that were the best approximations of their natural cli habitats: skyscrapers and apartments with ledges and overhangs, tall bridges and spires, and electrical pylons. Not just as vantage points but as nesting sites.
A survey by the British Trust for Ornithology in 2014, covering 1,769 breeding pairs in the U.K., found that urban peregrines were doing better than in their traditional homes. With cities getting better lit, some peregrines became partially nocturnal, targeting ¢ocks migrating at night. From personal experience, most prefer west-facing highrises with shady ledges at least 15 to 16 ¢oors high. Many choose pylons, especially near wetlands. Like the dark tiercel I saw last week, streaking after a ¢ickering ¢ock of plovers at Kelambakkam.
Breeding pairs and pigeon hunters
This movement also coincided with exploding feral pigeon populations. In India, their numbers went up by 150% in the last two decades, consequent to cities growing taller, astrology-fuelled feeding and loss of green spaces. Some of the pigeons’ other predators, like the shikra which depends on tree cover, suddenly became less relevant.
Pigeons negatively aect local biodiversity by depressing the numbers of birds such as sparrows and mynahs (by sheer numbers and direct competition for food sources), and even food plants (they tend to attack saplings and grains). Worse still, they carry the threat of disease — there is an increasing trend of hypersensitive pneumonia among people overly exposed to pigeons. Making the presence of urban peregrines important; at places, pigeons form 80% of their diet.
What also helped is that people took kindly to having this charismatic hunter as a nesting neighbour. London has 30 breeding pairs, some with a live telecast of the nest! Shaheens have sporadically been reported nesting in Mumbai, our tallest city. But relatively little is known of peregrine numbers, movements and habits in Indian cities.
In Delhi, a handful of birds are known to frequent the same highrises annually. But most other sightings are from wetlands and individuals are not tracked. What about the jungle of vertigo-inducing highrises spawning across the NCR? This is where dedicated and technically-grounded citizen science programmes like the MNS come in, bridging the divide between the wild and us. Long may the peregrines rule our lonely, concrete sky islands.
The second in a series that looks at urban spaces as havens for biodiversity and often overlooked species.
The author is a birder and writer based in Chennai.