Chaska Herald Story on Former TRC Bald Eagle Patient

The Chaska Herald had a nice follow-up story to a former bald eagle patient at TRC.  You can see pictures and read more in a previous post here.

Programs and Places to See TRC in June

If you can't get to our Center on the St Paul campus of the University of Minnesota, why don't you come out and see us at some of our upcoming programs around the state?  You can always find where we are appearing on our public events calendar.  We have some festivals coming up in June.  We are also appearing at a series of All About Owls free public programs around Minnesota in June.  They are intended for children ages 3-10, but everyone is welcome! Some of the cities we will be at include Wells, Winnebago, Waseca, St Peter, Lewisville and others.

Peregring Falcons Banded at Colonnade

Staff of The Raptor Center and the Midwest Peregrine Society banded four healthy peregrine chicks at the Colonnade building. There are two different bands placed on the birds’ legs; one is a federal band with nine digits, and the other is a color or project band; in this case, they are black and red. The bands will identify the birds throughout their lives as they hopefully fledge and find nesting territories. We use this information to track site preferences, population dynamics such as survival, longevity and dispersal, heredity, and other aspects of species’ biology. Blood samples were taken for later study, and the chicks were quickly taken back to their nest box. The Colonnade site is one of the oldest and most productive in the Twin Cities area; since 1991 and counting this year, there have been 74 chicks produced at this site.


The Midwest Peregrine Society, headquartered at The Raptor Center and headed by TRC’s co-founded and former executive director Patrick Redig, has a database that contains information about sites and birds for the project. This includes 13 Midwestern states and 2 Canadian provinces. At the end of the busy peregrine banding season, all of the information will be put into the database, which is available to the public.

Harmon's Countdown to Fledging!

With his parents very engaged in bringing food to the nest of the hungry chick, Harmon appears to be quite healthy and growing at the rapid pace that his species is known for. He is behaving like a normal eagle chick, often peering over the edge of his nest. At this age - almost six weeks old - he is right about at the halfway point before fledging. This is when Harmon's very visible flight feathers will be able to sustain his very first attempts at flight from the only home he has known - the safety of his nest.


Many of you have been following Harmon's story since his dramatic rescue and return to the nest a few weeks ago.  Like many of you, we are enjoying this wonderful opportunity to peer into a world normally unseen by humans. As much as we think we know about wildlife, much of their world is still hidden from us. Harmon fortunately had a much different ending to his story than many wild raptors. We look forward to continuing to monitor his progress. (Minnesota Bound Live Camera link here.)

Raptor Nest Cams

It is definitely "baby season" for raptors.  Thanks to the technology available with nest cams, we can all check in and watch our favorite raptor families as they grow.  A couple of great cameras: the Decorah Iowa eagles, courtesy of the Raptor Resource Project (see the first picture - they are so big!); peregrine falcon cameras, such as the one showing the family at the Bremer building in St Paul, MN, and three cameras sponsored by Xcel Energy; and a red-tailed hawk camera sponsored by Cornell. 

The Raptor Center Helps Celebrate Arbor Day in Maple Grove, MN

The Raptor Center appeared at the 2012 Maple Grove Arbor Day Festival May 19 at the Maple Grove Community Center.  There are more photos here, taken by Wendy Erlien. 

Former TRC Bald Eagle Patient

Jon Smithers, photographer and friend of TRC, was able to photograph a USFWS (federal) band on a bald eagle with a nest that he had been observing.  The bird is one that TRC banded as a nestling in 1998. It had fallen out of the nest (in Chaska) and had a broken pelvis. Since pelvic fractures heal best with "bed rest" and young chicks heal fractures at an amazing rate, TRC rebuilt the nest and returned it to its parents. With tincture of time, good feeding by its parents and a safer nest situation, it obviously thrived!  This bird is now a successful adult as you can see from these pictures taken May 7 this year.  Jon has a couple of videos on YouTube that he also filmed here (where you can see the bird's band) and here.