Our Crowdfunding Groups
Quick update on our resident raptors: Annie laid her first egg this evening! We'll have more updates posted on our Facebook page, Twitter, and Instagram. And most importantly, here are the permanent links to the nest cam and balcony cam.
Once again, we would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to all of you for making this happen. It is truly incredible to be able to follow the lives of these amazing animals and we would not have been able to do this without each and every one of you.
Big news! On January 7th, we successfully installed two cameras on the Campanile. The peregrines have both been visiting the nest site since the installation! The nest camera can be found here and the ledge camera can be found here.
And speaking of the campus’s celebrity couple: we have a winner in our naming contest. In honor of some of Cal’s greatest scientific minds, the male Peregrine Falcon will be named “Grinnell” after Joseph Grinnell and the female Peregrine Falcon will be named “Annie” after Annie Montague Alexander.
Annie Alexander was a renowned naturalist and philanthropist who founded the University of California’s Museum of Paleontology and Museum of Vertebrate Zoology. She was one of the most influential naturalists of the early 20th century and a driving force behind University of California’s scientific direction.
Joseph Grinnell was hired by Annie Alexander as the founding director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology. He was a man of remarkable foresight. He exhaustively catalogued the fauna of California across the state in the hopes that future scientists would be able to use that information to see an accurate snapshot of how much the state changed. Indeed, his studies are being repeated as the Grinnell Resurvey Project to assess effects of Climate change on the State’s fauna.
Our Berkeley Peregrine Webcam project has been a fantastic success and we cannot be more excited for the support that you have shown to these birds. Again, we send a heartfelt THANK YOU to everyone who helped us make this possible.
In addition to the donors to this project, we wanted to extend a huge thank you to everyone else who has helped along the way, including UC Berkeley staff from Development and Alumni Relations, Facilities Services and Asset Management, Fund Management, Information Systems and Technology, Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, Police Department, Sather Tower building and Carillon program, Office of Communications and Public Affairs, and Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, as well as organizations outside the University including the East Bay Regional Park District, Golden Gate Raptor Observatory, and Institute for Wildlife Studies.
In the coming weeks, we will be shifting updates on the birds to our new facebook page.
We can’t wait for this nesting season to start! Expect to hear more from us shortly as the birds start to initiate nesting!
THANK YOU to all the donors for helping us reach and exceed our initial crowdfund goal!! We are in the final days of fundraising - if you know of anyone who may be interested in helping us reach our STRETCH GOAL, please reach out to them.
For a fascinating historical account of perhaps the only successful pair of urban nesting peregrine falcons in North America prior to their population crash in the 1950s - please see the link below to access “Great Moments in Action; the Story of the Sun Life Falcons”, by G. Harper Hall, reprinted by The Canadian Field-Naturalist 1970, Vol 84 (3): 209-230. The link will take you to the archived reprint in the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/93459#page/235/mode/1up
We are looking forward to our own “Great Moments in Action” with U.C. Berkeley’s Falcons! Thank you again for your wonderful support of the Campanile Peregrine Webcam.
As we enter the "Home Stretch" towards reaching our Stretch Goal of $16,000, we want to express our heartfelt thanks for your support of our Campanile Peregrine Webcam Project. The number of people who have donated is truly remarkable. We are so grateful to every one of you!
The picture below is of Lawrencium, who fledged from the UC Campanile this year. She was photographed after being trapped and released in the Marin Headlands by the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory on August 29, 2019. She is in her juvenile plumage of chocolate brown head and back with light mottled undersides. Note the black visual identification band on her left leg. If you look closely at the band you can read her unique alphanumeric code: the numeral "11" over the letters "AM". Thanks to this band, we have been able to "follow" her to a couple locations around the Bay. As Allen Fish mused, "She is exhibiting all the traits needed to promote a long falcon life". There is no telling where she may show up next!
Here is a short history of Lawrencium:
A huge “THANK YOU!” to everyone for helping us reach and exceed our funding goal!!!! We can now look forward to ordering the equipment soon to get ready for the 2019 nesting season. We hope to have the system up and running by the New Year so that the adult falcons can get used to the webcam well before they shift into breeding mode.
We have created a new stretch goal of $16,000 to secure additional funds for maintenance and repair of the webcam system AND to hire a student intern for research, video archiving and preparing educational materials. We are particularly excited about giving a student intern such an opportunity. Please join us in helping to reach our Stretch Goal!
Please see our next update, where we report on sightings of Lawrencium, the female peregrine who fledged along with her two brothers from the Campanile in 2018. Thanks to her Visual Identification Band, which is black with a silver unique alpha-numeric code (11/AM), we know what she has been up to!
This has been a fantastic first week – we have exceeded the half-way mark in our fundraising goal! Thank You to all who have donated!!!
For your enjoyment we have uploaded a short video on the history of our pair of falcons nesting on the Campanile. Please see below.
Please help us achieve our goal by letting friends know about our project.
Thank you very much!!!
The Campanile Peregrine Webcam Team
For $25 or more, we will send an electronic photo card thank you, plus you may enter a competition to name the adult peregrines (pool of names will be considered by the Fund Raising Team).
With $100 or more donation, you will receive a beautiful photo of a peregrine falcon taken by Mary Malec.
A $200 contribution will get you a personalized visit with our Fledge-watch Team. This will include viewing the peregrines on the Campanile through a scope and a history of these nesting peregrines. Visit will take place during nesting season.
For $500 donation, you will receive a watercolor painting of a beautiful peregrine falcon feather. Artist: Mary Malec
For a $1,000 donation, you will receive a personal tour for up to four people of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology with Carla Cicero, Staff Curator of Birds OR, a tour of Golden Gate Raptor Observatory with Allen Fish, Director (choice of contributor).
General birding field trip with Sean Peterson in East Bay Regional Parks OR, visit to a different urban peregrine nest site with Mary Malec/Doug Bell OR visit to a well-known natural peregrine nest site with Mary Malec/Doug Bell to observe nesting peregrines from a safe distance without disturbing them (choice of contributor).
For a contribution of $2,000 or more, you will receive a watercolor painting of a peregrine falcon from the artist, Lynn Schofield.
