Hope in Peregrin Falcons: Finding Love in a Lonely World
There are millions of people living in Chicago and I’m still single. This is not without trying. I smile at cute baristas. I download the apps. I join clubs, trying to meet people with shared interests. All of that to no avail. Sometimes, I think it’d be easier to have a matchmaker unite me with my perfect pair. But at this point, I don’t believe that I’ll find someone to complete me. I love being alone. I stay up too late. I’m too aggressive and too defensive at the same time. I long for a home and a far-off horizon to fly away; a true raptor in nature that scares lovers off. In moving to the city, I’m learning that there is no taming a wild creature, only nudging them in a direction that is best for them and their future. I don’t know exactly where that is for me.
Maybe it’s on a steep cliff by a body of water, where you might be able to spot a young peregrine falcon practicing flight for the first time or its parents stalking a duck for lunch. Or not. Even in their natural habitat, they’re a rare sight. However, they’re not as rare as they used to be. In 1970, the peregrine falcon was listed as an endangered species. Habitat destruction and widespread use insecticides like DDT decimated the population until there were no mating pairs left in the Midwest. Love seemed hopeless, but not forgotten. With help of a caring community, adapting to a new environment, and policy changes, the peregrine falcon came back from the brink of death to live its “Sex in the City” fantasy. If they can persist in such an environment, then so can I.
The mid 80’s was a whirl of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Reaganomics, the Chernobyl and Challenger disasters, and an ever-increasing concern about the peregrine falcon population. What was once a flourishing species in the Midwest, had become a ghost of its former self and on the edge of extinction. Though DDT had been banned for over a decade at this point, there seemed to be little hope of resurrecting the population.
That was when the Chicago Peregrine Program was born. Taking one female peregrine from Minnesota and one male from Illinois, the organization bred the pair, raising the young with falcon puppets so that they didn’t become attached to the humans around them, then released them in the wild. They stopped breeding in 1990’s because the falcons knew what to do from there. What started with a nonexistent in the population has now blossomed to twenty mating pairs in over thirty territories since the program’s conception.
Mary Hennen, ornithologist at the Field Museum and key figure in the Chicago Peregrine Program explained to me how these raptors have adapted to city living. Instead of a coastal cliff, they make home in the lake front high-rises downtown. The lovebirds’ nest might be awe-inspiring to the businessman, who has gained an interesting distraction from work, or the terrifying presence of a predator to the smoker who just wants a few minutes with their cigarette. At this point in the program, Mary’s job now is to coordinate with the sites to cohabitate with the falcons during their nesting season. She says, “the more you know and understand, then the less of a problem is. I think the problem comes when you don't know what this bird is and what's gonna happen and how long it's gonna last and it's the not knowing that creates fear versus understanding the species”.
In the case that the building is not enthusiastic about having a primordial predator on their stoop, the solution is simple: move the nest after the two months it takes to rear their young and they’ll find a new home. Mary told me that “it's not any different on some level if there's the storm and an avalanche and the peregrine on the coast loses that particular ledge it's going to move to another ledge and your urban peregrine is going to move to another one”. Even urban threats such as construction emulate a Great Horned Owl moving near their home on a natural cliffside. Even though one is in a downtown metropolitan does not change the primordial reaction of the falcon to move and find a new nest. Their environment might look different, but the life of a city falcon remains quite similar to their original habitat. They are similar in the amount of comfort and dangers.
DDT has been banned since the 1972, yet other threats to peregrine love persist. Sound and light pollution from the city, continuous use of other insecticides, and a bad blight of avian flu continue to attack the steady peregrine population. Yet this comeback kid has proved its determination for survival through love as well as an organized effort of private programs and the government to care for a dying species. A once decimated population has become a darling of birders and apartment dwellers alike in Chicago, showing that with the proper coordination, the success of the peregrines can be replicated for other endangered species. As Mary said to me, “everybody doesn't have to do this huge thing. If everybody did one small thing of find whatever your interest is whether it's birds, whether it's fish, whether it is planting, you know the cumulative effect that can be huge”. This can include planting milkweed in the park for monarch butterflies or making birdhouses for purple martins. The city is not sperate from nature, but another format for use to continue our relationship with it.
Just a small-town girl living in a lonely world who moved to Chicago from a rural town, I struggle with finding a balance between the city and nature. My love life here has consisted of people who don’t know that wood sorrel tastes great in a salad or that red wing black birds will kamikaze dive into the back of your head during mating season. City slickers with pierced eye brows and sleeves of ironic tattoos tell me about the coolest new bands and the underground venues to see them. I have yet to find a cutie with razor sharp talons and a forty-inch wingspan, but according to Mary, there are plenty. She said that there’s “wildlife that lives in the city absolutely where they living you know think of all the parks we have and all the golf courses and all the lakefront and all this habitat that we have around here”. This habitat she spoke of is also filled with sky rises and street slush and dumpsters filled with amazon boxes. Yet, wildlife can persevere in this seemingly unnatural place. The falcons say so.
As part of this urban environment, a place where the peregrine falcons find love and thrive, a place where rabbits nibble at sidewalk dandelions and white tail deer find refuge in the cemetery by my apartment, I’m reminded to not separate myself so much from others. The punksters and finance bros and yoga girlies are all on the same quest as I am: to find connection with a like species. According to the falcons, anyone can bounce back from extreme loneliness and find a pair despite external factors that might not be perfect. Maybe the domesticated people I meet here are actually other falcons in different forms, are other wild creatures with the same loneliness. My love is not endangered, but I’m not giving it the opportunity to evolve in my new environment. A wild creature must adapt to their surroundings, shift their patterns and perspective in order to thrive. Then, maybe, I’ll be able to find my own falcon mate in a place I never thought I would.