Death from Above

 

Peregrine falcons are the fastest things with feathers, reaching a mind-blowing 240 mph when dive-bombing aerial prey. This female booted her mate off her favorite piece of driftwood at Stone Harbor Point. Meet one of my favorite animals.

Peregrines rule the winter beaches of Stone Harbor. They fear nothing. One day while looking for snowy owls here, I heard a distant whining call. I thought, "I know that sound. That's a snowy owl!" Far down the beach, too far to photograph despite my efforts, I could see a peregrine stooping on a snowy. Again and again, the peregrine swooped down on the terrified owl, who ducked its head and continued ducking and looking around frantically long after the falcon had tired of the game and flown away.

A male falcon takes off on a sortie over the beach. Falcons here target semipalmated sandpipers and other shorebirds. 

Peregrines often nest on buildings and other structures like the Stone Harbor water tower. 

A juvenile peregrine lands on an osprey platform at Forsythe. 

My interest in wildlife sometimes dovetailed with my job as a newspaper reporter as happened when a biologist with the New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife called to see if I wanted to see some peregrine chicks. Yeah, I want to see some peregrine chicks! A few minutes later, our photographer and I were holding a cardboard box of fluffy raptors. The state removed them from a nest at the Walt Whitman Bridge for relocation to the New River Gorge in West Virginia where they would be raised by hand until fledging. Since raptors return to nest at the place where they learn to fly, this hacking method is an effective way to reintroduce them. That's how New Jersey brought American bald eagles back to the Garden State after they were wiped out by DDT. 

There's no sneaking up on a falcon. Their vision is extraordinary. But I learned how to approach them without bothering them. And when you have your pics, you retreat the same way so as not to disturb them. This one had just finished a meal and still had blood on its lower feathers.

This peregrine was too cold to care when I noticed her while hiking on the beach at Cape May Point. The feathers help trap a layer of air to keep her warm in the chill.

During one outing, I found a peregrine perching on a beach rules sign. I took some photos but I didn't like them. I don't like photos with manmade objects in my wildlife shots. As I headed back to the parking lot, walking the mile or so at the edge of the surf, I heard a whoosh of wings overhead. It was the peregrine buzzing me as she flew north up the island, reminding me that she has a rule of her own: this is her beach. So cool.