Welcome Felker!! We are so happy to have Felker join us as a possible educational ambassador. He is 13 years old and has quite an interesting life story. He was one of 3 hatchlings to Madame X and Surge in Hamilton, Ontario in 2012. He first took a mate, BB, in 2014 at the Richardson site in Buffalo. By 2017 he was with Rita at the Richardson site but disappeared after their eggs were laid. It was later determined that he had a mate named Gleig at the Central Terminal site in Buffalo. Gleig was actually his "sister" as she was one of the young from 2009 by Madame X and Surge. He spent several years raising young with Gleig while also attempting to maintain the Richardson nest site. This went on until 2020 when a new male kept him away from the Richardson site. Information obtained to date puts his last siting in November of 2021.
He was brought into the Erie County SPCA/Wildlife Clinic in September of 2023 after being found in someone's basement. This part of the story has been blown out of proportion. He was found in someone's basement and the person who found him put him in a bird cage and then contacted the police. When the police were told that the bird had bands on its legs, they presumed it was someone's pet. They told the find that he could try to locate the owner or that he could sell the bird. The finder posted the bird for sale on Craig's list and someone noticed that a peregrine falcon was being sold and reported it to the DEC. Once contacted by the DEC the finder immediately turned the bird over to the SPCA. Unfortunately, he sustained major feather damage during his short time in captivity. The SPCA retained Felker for about a year waiting for him to molt in new feathers. He never molted in new full feathers. He was sent to Cornell wildlife clinic in September of 2024, where he underwent a series of feather extractions in an attempt to force a molt. After a year of feather extractions and recovery time at a local rehab facility, he was deemed unreleasable with a diagnosis of "Feather Dystrophy". The local rehab facility, was not interested in adding another educational animal but knew about my love of Peregrines and contacted me about the possibility of retaining Felker for education. I went to see him and thought he was quite the mess but I knew I had to give him this chance. So we brought him here and are doing our best to keep him stress free while gaining his confidence so that we can handle him to get him acquainted with the educational ambassador life.
Couple of interesting side notes:
One of his offspring - Judson (2018) returned to his father's nest site in Hamilton to become Lily's mate in 2021.
Gleig is the mom of "Billie" from Rochester NY.