Category

Northern Aplomado Falcon

The aplomado falcon is a bird hawk ranging from the southern edge of the United States, including Texas, all the way to the Tierra del Fuego, and from sea level to altitudes as high as 14,000 feet. In 1986, it was declared endangered in the U.S. due to concerns over pesticide contamination and population declines.

Interviews

Narrator: Peter JennyTitle: GunpowderDuration: 00:01:26Date: July 1, 2022Peter Jenny, a falconer, trained zoologist and the former CEO of the Peregrine Fund, recalls the once-common practice of shooting raptors. He points out how the age-old hunting partnership of humans, horses, dogs, and raptors was broken apart by the arrival of gunpowder and firearms. Narrator: Peter JennyTitle: GrasslandDuration: 00:03:22Date: July 1, 2022Peter Jenny, a biologist and the former CEO of the Peregrine Fund, was involved in captive breeding and release of the Northern Aplomado Falcon. Here he tells of the challenge of restoring the falcon to south Texas, where the grassland that formerly supported the bird had been widely lost to brush encroachment.Narrator: Peter JennyTitle: Private PropertyDuration: 00:02:48Date: July 1, 2022Peter Jenny, a biologist, falconer and CEO of the Peregrine Fund, recalls the effort to reintroduce the rare aplomado falcon to private lands in South Texas. Property owners were skittish about the possible impact of the Endangered Species Act, and so the Fund worked with the Fish and Wildlife Service to build a Safe Harbor program to shield landowners from liability under the Act, in exchange for allowing the bird's release.Narrator: Dean Keddy-HectorTitle: Baseline DataDuration: 00:03:04Date: June 7, 2022Dean Keddy-Hector, a biologist who worked at Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute, and taught biology at the college level, wrote the report that formed the basis for listing the aplomado falcon as an endangered species. Here, he explains the difficulties in determining how common the falcon was in earlier times.Narrator: Dean Keddy-HectorTitle: ChemicalsDuration: 00:03:09Date: June 7, 2022Dean Keddy-Hector, a biologist who worked at Texas Parks and Wildlife, and taught at the college level, was responsible for the application to list the aplomado falcon as endangered. Here he explains that the listing primarily drew on concerns that the bird's populations could crash due to eggshell thinning from DDT and DDE. In more recent years, worries have arisen from other long-lived chemicals found in fire retardants and rodenticides.Narrator: Dean Keddy-HectorTitle: Nests & NestlingsDuration: 00:02:22Date: June 7, 2022Dean Keddy-Hector, has worked as a scientist for Texas Parks and Wildlife, and taught biology at the college level. He has also studied the aplomado falcon for many years. Here he discusses the artificial nesting platforms that the Peregrine Fund developed to protect reintroduced aplomado falcon nestlings from predation. The success of these platforms suggested that the lack of good nesting sites may be one factor limiting aplomados from moving further north.