A Long-Awaited Homecoming for Peregrine Falcons in the Finger Lakes | All About Birds All About Birds
Just a few miles north of Ithaca, New York, Taughannock Creek (pro?nounced tuh-GAN-uck) carves between the sheer rock walls of a 400-foot gorge, dropping toward Cayuga Lake in a free-fall curtain of water taller than Niagara Falls. There’s a state park trail up this gorge, with a sun-faded sign at the trailhead that bears a mono?chrome photograph of a Peregrine Falcon perched by her cliffside nest, hulking protectively over three downy white chicks. Framed by the white waters of the Taughannock cataract, the peregrine mother is a picture of power: her velocity-hewn teardrop shape is steadfast, even as the film’s long exposure captures the water rushing by. Her gaze is transfixing, even through the sign’s grainy, faded ink and the century that now separates us.
