University of Leeds Peregrines

The first egg of 2024 was laid on 21 March by the falcon ringed 7.H. Three further eggs were laid on 24, 26 and 28 March. A number of bleached (light coloured) eggs that failed to hatch in 2023 could also be seen in the nesting area.

The first egg hatched at successfully 2:43pm on Wednesday 1 May with the other three eggs hatching over the following two days.

The Yorkshire Wildlife Trust came to ring the chicks on 17 May, detail as follows:

• Metal ring: GY66025, colour ring Z34. Weight 450g (likely male).
• Metal ring: GY66026, colour ring Z74. Weight 650g (likely female).
• Metal ring: GY66027, colour ring ZX4. Weight 475g (likely male).
• Metal ring: GY66028, colour ring ZD6. Weight 625g (likely female).

Four eggs were laid in 2023, on 21, 24, 26 and 29 March. Unfortunately none of the eggs hatched when expected at the end of April. The falcon continued to incubate the eggs for some time after this, but was noted to have left the nest area in mid July.

Four eggs were laid in 2022, on 19^th, 21^st, 24^th and 26^th March. A bleached (light coloured) egg from last year’s failed hatching was also noted on the ledge. Incubation began on 24^th March and hatching began on 27^th April.

Due to on the ongoing restrictions again only limited monitoring was possible in the build up to egg laying.

Three eggs were laid on 23^rd, 25^th and 28^th March, with expected hatching 34-35 days after the third egg being laid. All three eggs failed to hatch, possibly due to the cold weather in April and a first time breeding falcon, with Huddersfield (1), Nottingham (1) and Sheffield (2) also saw a lower number of successful hatchings and fledgings.

Due to the Covid-19 lockdown during March only limited monitoring of peregrine behaviour around the Parkinson Tower was possible as the breeding season progressed. No eggs were laid during end March/early April and it was not until May that a new female (falcon) was seen on the nest tray, identified by rings on legs.

Unfortunately due to damage to the plastic Darvic ring the code was unreadable and her identity was initially unknown. Leedsbirder finally managed to phonescope and read the darvic in 2021 and identify her as 7.H who was ringed at the nest by West Midlands Ringing Group in Stoke 2017.

Laying was a bit earlier than 2018, with four eggs being laid in March. All four had successfully hatched by the end of April.

In May, the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust came to ring the chicks.  The rings were black text on an orange background. Detail as follows:

• TCD - weight 725g
• TAD - weight 675g
• TBD - weight 525g
• T7C - weight 700g

The new tray and camera were successfully installed early in the year. In mid-April, the pair were seen on the tray and were mating.  Not long after, they were seen on the camera making a scrape and in early May we had our first eggs!  Three eggs were laid in total and all hatched in June.

At the end of June, the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust came to campus to ring the chicks. The rings were black text on an orange background.  Detail as follows:

• TAC, weight 550g
• T7B , weight 700g
• TBC, weight 565g

Thanks to a member of the public the remains of a juvenile peregrine wing were found on the Parkinson steps in Jul 2019.

Following the failure of breeding in 2020 various moulted feathers were collected and sent with the partial juvenile wing to Sheffield university for DNA analysis by Deborah Dawson from The NERC Environmental Omics Visitor Facility and kindly analysed by Lucy Knowles.

A suitable feather from each sample was analysed. All three sexing markers and 22 out of 23 microsat markers were identified.

Both feathers were sexed as male sharing a lot of alleles. From the results it looks like that sadly one of the young males from 2019 (the two other young being one female and one male) did not survive long after fledging.