Good News Regarding The Escaped Peregrine Falcon and American Kestrel

Recently I’ve photographed and posted about two escaped falconry birds – a female American Kestrel and a Peregrine Falcon.  Both were flying free with attached jesses and/or anklets in the vicinity of Antelope Island.  Both were reported to wildlife authorities and to the falconry community but each bird has been a challenge to recapture for a variety of reasons – among them the difficulty of getting proper permission for the licensed trapper to attempt the recapture of the kestrel in a state park.  There were lots of hoops to jump through.

It is very likely, for a variety of reasons, that both of these birds were originally captured illegally by “wannabe” falconers and not by anyone in the organized and licensed falconry community.

Two days after we found the kestrel we met the licensed trapper out on the island to point out the area where the bird was hanging out and to try to find her, which we never did.

But yesterday morning we spotted the female Kestrel once again, in the very same area where we found her before.  She was far off but when she scratched her face one of the jesses became obvious, as you can see in this photo.  I immediately called the trapper to report that the bird was in the area again and she was enthusiastic about making the attempt but as far as she knew, permissions from the state still hadn’t been obtained.

A little background before I get to the good news.  When Mark Runnels (master falconer from Oklahoma) saw my first post on the female kestrel, he put me in touch with Christopher Wall, new president of the Utah Falconers Association (UFA), which started a fortunate ball rolling.  Christopher began to work on setting up an improved process for reporting lost falconry birds (currently, that process is cumbersome, inefficient and frustrating) and he is also working with the North American Falconers Association (NAFA) to see if those changes can be implemented on a national basis.  Christopher has also been doing the legwork required to get state permission to recapture the kestrel.

Late last night I received an email from Christopher reporting the following developments:

• Permission has been obtained to trap the kestrel on Antelope Island State Park
• DWR has agreed that, in the future, any bird with visible “falconry furniture” (jesses, anklets etc) can be trapped by any falconer with a legal falconry permit, as long as they get permission from the state agency administering the property involved.  In the past, rules only allowed most falconers to trap their own escaped birds
• The Peregrine Falcon I reported and documented has been recaptured!  It has been turned over to a local rehab facility for health inspection and since it is not a reported legal falconry bird and is a native species it will be released to the wild.
• UFA members often give presentations to public groups.  Christopher and UFA are in the process of developing information that will be stressed during these presentations regarding the negative implications of “rogue” (illegal and unlicensed) falconry
• There has been some concern that apprentice level falconers aren’t getting enough guidance from their licensed falconry sponsors.  Inexperienced falconers sometimes make mistakes and birds get away.    So UFA is in the process of amending their training program for apprentices to mitigate the risk of lost birds with equipment attached.
• Efforts to recapture the female kestrel are still ongoing.  Since she apparently isn’t a legal falconry bird, it’s my understanding that if she can be captured she also will be released to the wild after her jesses and anklets have been removed and she passes health muster.

This is the Peregrine Falcon that was recently recaptured and will likely be released.  You can easily see the anklets on the legs.

For what it’s worth, I still have a few concerns about falconry but I feel much better about the “sport” after investigating it a bit and working with folks like Mark and Christopher.  In my opinion, things are moving in the right direction, largely due to their efforts.

Ron