DEC to test UB falcon eggs

There’s some sad news to report on the UB wildlife front.

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation confirmed that the four eggs laid by UB’s falcons, Dixie and Yankee, were not viable. The eggs, which emerged about two months ago, were removed from the nesting box at the top of MacKay Heating Plant along Winspear Avenue at the southeast corner of UB’s South Campus last week.

They will be tested by DEC to determine why they didn’t hatch.

Over the past several weeks, falcon observers expressed how heartbreaking it was to watch Dixie panting excessively as she stood over the eggs. The first egg was discovered on March 23 and a second appeared two days later. By March 31, there were five eggs.

According to DEC, this is not the first non-viable nesting box in Western New York. In 2015, there were several nests with unhatched eggs.

Female peregrine falcons typically lay two to four eggs and the normal incubation period is 29 to 33 days, according to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. So when there were no signs of eyases — the term for a nestling falcon — in early May, wildlife observers monitoring peregrine falcon activity across Buffalo began to worry. On May 4, someone noticed a broken egg shell, but no eyas.

“The falcons laid their nest at the normal time, and all proceeded normally until about two weeks ago when Dixie, the female, was observed to be panting heavily while she incubated,” explains DEC Region 9 spokesperson Kristen Davidson. When the eggs did not hatch within the normal period of time – as well as an additional 20-day cushion after that – DEC wildlife biologists made the call to collect the eggs.

More than two-dozen peregrine chicks have fledged from the nest box at UB since 2009, the year the nesting box was installed at MacKay.