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The first year of a young falcon's life
by Giacomo Dell'Omo, president of Ornis italica

In May 2017, the researchers of Ornis italica equipped Seti , a young peregrine falcon, of a Gps-Gsm transmitter with solar recharge that allowed to follow the movements, providing new and important scientific data on the behavior of young hawks.

Seti was born on April 3, 2017 by Agar and Vento, one of the couples of pilgrims who nested in Rome in an artificial nest located on the roof of the Department of Economics of La Sapienza University of Rome, with the support of Terna.

The transmitter is a small instrument of only a few grams that, secured by a backpack on the back of the hawk with a slight teflon harness, represents a negligible nuisance in the daily life of the bird, but provides precise information on its movements.

The quantity and the quality of the information collected thanks to the Gps have been useful to know the behavior of the hawk since its first flights. The GPS then recorded its movements once food independence was achieved by the parents. At the beginning Seti explored the territory and then settled in Rome, near the nest where he was born.

The movements . Following Seti in the first months of life, we noticed different behaviors according to the seasons. Summer is dedicated to exploration, with peaks of daily distances traveled over 200 kilometers. Few areas of Lazio remain unknown to our falcon, who between June and August visited the Castelli Romani Park several times, the western chains of the central Apennines, the coast between Anzio and Ostia, the volcanic lakes of the Viterbo area. Between 7 and 8 August, two of the hottest days of 2017, Seti toured176 km passing through the upper Lazio and then Rieti, returning to Rome after a flight in the Sabine Mountains where it reached over 2500 meters above sea level. Probably trying to escape the heat on the fresh slopes and the windy mountain peaks ... The longest recorded trip was on a morning at the end of August: Seti left the University and flew uninterruptedly to Abruzzo, on the slopes of the Gran Sasso, and then again in the center of Rome in the early afternoon after covering a distance of 215 km.

Scientific observations . Until recently, the young falcon falcons were thought to migrate southwards, through the channel of Sicily to Africa and beyond the Sahara desert (the name "pilgrim" was not randomly given to this species) . Yet neither Seti nor other seven hawks that we have equipped with transmitters have moved away from Italy and sometimes from the region in which they were born. It will therefore be necessary to review the hypotheses on juvenile dispersion in the light of these new observations.

The speed . The peregrine falcon is known as the fastest animal in the world, capable of flying over 320 km / h. But our hawk has generally supported modest speeds (on average 40 km / h) and the GPS may not have been able to detect the rare beaten (in one case the speed of 192 km / h was recorded). In addition, he spent most of the time perched (almost 90% of the day, excluding night), usually on elevated perches like pylons, towers or other buildings that offer a wide field of vision. Some of these are structures near the building of the Department of Economics, where he was born. From these elevated positions the hawks can scan the sky in search of birds that they catch only in flight, especially pigeons, starlings and parakeets, among the most widespread species of birds in the city.

The seasons . The end of the summer coincided with a decrease in the distances traveled daily. Starting from October, Seti rarely left his home, and in December he almost never went outside Rome.

The researchers of Ornis italica continue to receive and analyze the data collected by the GPS, which after almost a year from the activation confirm that Seti is in perfect health and is perhaps deciding where to settle. The analysis of the displacements may suggest the place to install a new nest box ...

Together with the monitoring of artificial nests via webcam on the Birdcam.it portal , the use of Gps transmitters allows to get new knowledge on the life of the peregrine falcon, which after a thirty-year absence began to nest in Rome in 2004 thanks to artificial nests that Terna and Ornis italica began to install in the city.