Bald eagle, peregrine falcon recovering, still need protection in PA

The peregrine falcon is officially "recovered" and the bald eagle is rapidly heading in that direction, according to the federal government.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last summer officially declared the peregrine, the world's fastest bird, "recovered" and removed it from the Endangered Species List.

In addition, the service announced plans to remove the bald eagle, currently listed as a threatened species, from the list. That could happen as soon as this summer.

Both birds had been wiped out in the state, but recovery efforts supported by the Wild Resource Conservation Fund and others have helped to bring them back.

Still, the story for the two birds is more mixed in the state than it is nationwide. While the bald eagle is making a strong comeback here, the recovery of the peregrine falcon has been slow, according to Dan Brauning, an ornithologist with the Pennsylvania Game Commission.

In the United States and Canada, peregrines numbered only 39 nesting pairs in 1970 and have rebounded to about 1,650 pairs today, but most of that has happened in Western states. Its return has not been so dramatic in Pennsylvania and other Northeastern states where Brauning said the delisting may have been "a little premature."

Serious efforts to return peregrines to the state began in the mid-1980s, but by last year, there were 10 pairs of peregrines nesting in Pennsylvania, only a slight improvement from 8 pairs in 1998. For many years previous to that, the number hovered around 6 pairs.

Not only have the numbers not increased dramatically, peregrines in Eastern states have primarily built their nests on tall buildings and bridges - from which they swoop down on slower birds at speeds of up to 200 miles per hour - rather than on cliffs where they were found historically.

"We would like to see them being successful in natural sites," Brauning said. "But something is interfering with that. They're not going back to those locations."

Even as it delists the bird, Brauning said the Fish and Wildlife Service is taking action to prohibit the catch of eastern peregrines by falconers. Some had feared that delisting would allow some of those birds to be taken from the wild.

For the foreseeable future, Brauning said the peregrine appears likely to remain listed as endangered by Pennsylvania.

By contrast, the bald eagle appears to be making a strong comeback in the state. In 1999, Brauning said there were 43 active nests - an increase of 14 from the year before, and nearly double the 23 nests counted in 1997. "It's really remarkable," he said. "That is a tremendous jump."

Reintroduction efforts for the bald eagle began in the early 1980s, with 16 young birds being released annually for seven years. Gradually, the population has been built up both in Pennsylvania and in surrounding states.

Birds nesting in Pennsylvania today stem not only from reintroduction efforts, but also from expanding populations in nearby areas.

"It's not an exceptional observation anymore to see a bald eagle," Brauning said. Still, he said, the bald eagle was likely to remain listed as endangered by the state until the population recovers further.

Nationwide, both the bald eagle and the peregrine have made remarkable rebounds. Between the mid-1940s and 1965, peregrine falcons were totally wiped out in Eastern states, while populations in the West were reduced by 80-90 percent.

In Pennsylvania, the birds were gone by 1961 because of egg collecting - peregrine eggs are prized by collectors - falconry, shooting and the widespread use of the pesticide DDT.

The story for the bald eagle is much the same. When the Continental Congress in 1782 placed the bald eagle in the center of the Great Seal of the United States, an olive branch in one claw and 13 eagles in the other, there were as many as a half-million eagles in the skies of North America. By 1963, only 417 breeding pairs remained in the lower 48 states as a result of hunting, loss of prey and habitat and the widespread use of the DDT.

In Pennsylvania, bald eagles were commonly found in places such as the Lake Erie Shoreline and the lower Susquehanna, but they were gone from the river by the late 1940s and gone from Lake Erie by the late 1950s.

Even as they are removed from the federal endangered species list, the bald eagle and the peregrine falcon will still be protected not only by the state, but also by the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act, which prohibits the taking, killing, possession, transportation and importation of migratory birds. "Taking" is defined as shooting, poisoning, molesting or harming the bird."