Conquering Canada and the world
Ok, the headline may be a little bit over-the-top. However, I had the tremendous privilege of being interviewed for about five minutes on the Canadian Broadcast Corporation’s Winnipeg, Manitoba, affiliate today to chat about Peregrine Falcons. Why would our neighbors to the north want to talk to some yokel in Nebraska about Peregrine Falcons? Answer: our female, A/Y or “Ally”, was hatched in Winnipeg in 2004 and showed up in Lincoln in 2005 (and has been here ever since). Congrats to you if you knew the answer. They were merely catching up and seeing how the ol’ girl was doing. Thanks to Mike Green and Larry the afternoon guy for the opportunity to chat. They are still raising falcons in Winnipeg and also have a webcam, their page can be found:
http://www.cbc.ca/manitoba/features/falcon/about.html
That’s Canada, what about the world? Troy Kroeger (again, our IT guy who is the brains behind the operation, here) was gracious enough today to provide some information on who has been watching our falcons. Thousands of people have checked out our Peregrine webcams, but that total includes people from 49 countries! Sure, we have had only one hit from countries such as Lithuania and Singapore, but we’ve also had over a hundred hits from other countries such as China and the Netherlands. Cool stuff!
I noticed that the Winnipeg nest box is similar to most Peregrine Falcon nest boxes, in that it has 3 sides and a full roof. Are there any plans to redesign our nest box to something similar? I think it would benefit the chicks/eggs by increasing their protection from the elements, especially from the rain, hail, and high winds that we experience.
Also, the new webcam view into the nest is amazing! It is light years beyond every other webcam we have had in the past. Kudos to all involved. Will sound be added at some point? My only complaint is that it constantly freezes
Hi Opal:
Thanks for the comments and questions. First question’s answer is no. The current nestbox was redesigned a couple years ago to blend into the Capitol’s design and it was an arduous process. What you see now is a compromise and the birds are having no trouble. We will always look at ways to improve the webcam experience and may look at sound at some point. Yeah, the freezing is a concern.
-Joel