Montreal peregrine falcon chicks take first flights into a world full of danger

The world is full of dangers when you're a falcon chick less than six weeks old and learning to fly — even if you're a member of the fastest species on Earth.

This week, three falcon chicks named Hugo, Polo and Estebane started to spread their wings around the nest site on the 23rd floor of the Université de Montréal tower, with hundreds of online viewers watching their every move.

While Hugo and Polo have already landed safely, their species faces tough odds of making it to adulthood, David Bird, an emeritus professor of wildlife biology at McGill University's Department of Natural Resource Sciences, told Canadian Press this week. Bird says about 50 per cent of falcon chicks don't survive to their first birthday. Other estimates put that number at two-thirds.

In an interview, he said the periods where the falcons fledge — or learn to fly — are particularly dangerous, especially for city birds. An inexperienced juvenile can fly into a window, get caught in a wind gust, or flutter to the ground, where it's at risk from cars or dogs.

Even if they survive to adulthood they face other dangers, including competition with other falcons, pesticides and chemicals — including the flame retardants used to put out forest fires — and, lately, avian flu.

However, Bird said there's no doubt the falcons are survivors. Widespread use of pesticides such as DDT and killings by humans decimated their numbers by the 1960s and 1970s. But in the decades since DDT was banned, recovery projects have been successful, to the point where the falcons "have gone from being near extinct in eastern North America, to now almost in some eyes becoming a pest species," he said, noting some people don't like birds on their building ledges.

Part of their success, Bird said, is their ability to adapt to cities, where highrise buildings have replaced cliffs as nest sites, and where an ample pigeon population provides plentiful prey.

Urban falcons, including those at Université de Montréal, have become ambassadors of sorts to the public in recent years thanks to livestreamed nest cameras.