| Summary: | Four peregrine falcon chicks drew quite a crowd Wednesday afternoon below the UND water tower. About 70 people gathered to watch regional raptor expert Tim Driscoll of Grand Forks band the four chicks, offspring of Terminator and Marv. Terminator, a female hatched in 2006 in Brandon, Man., has been nesting in Grand Forks since 2008, the first two years on the Smiley water tower and since 2010 on the UND water tower. This year, she produced four chicks with Marv, a newcomer who first showed up on the local peregrine scene last year. Four is a record hatch for Terminator, whose previous best was three, Driscoll said. The four chicks—two males and two females—hitched a ride from their nest box high atop the UND water tower courtesy of climbers Cory Floden and Nate Reitan, who ascended the tower and carefully placed the birds in a pet carrier, which they lowered to the ground by rope. Terminator, meanwhile, circled the 150-foot water tower none too happy about the disturbance, judging by her constant shrieks. Marv also showed up later after a midday hunting foray. "She's done this eight times before," Driscoll said. "She started squawking the second we put the ladder on the tower." Show and tell Driscoll, along with Laura Bell of the University of Minnesota-Crookston and her husband, Jeff Bell, a UND graduate student, banded the four chicks—in the process delivering one of the coolest show-and-tell sessions any of the spectators are likely to see anytime soon. Also helping was UMC student Tiffany Muellner. Gerry Nies and his wife, Patsy, of Grand Forks, were among the crowd who gathered to watch the banding and pet the downy chicks. Patsy Nies said she's attended more than half a dozen previous banding events, while Gerry Nies was watching for the second time. "It's absolutely fascinating to think they've come back from virtual extinction," he said. Besides banding the chicks with bands on each leg, the crew took blood samples for genetic testing and avian malaria before returning the birds to the pet carrier and ...
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