Watch peregrine falcon nests online via MDC partnerships

Kansas City, Mo. – Peregrine falcon nests in the Kansas City area are viewable online this spring, thanks to the Missouri Department of Conservation's (MDC) partnership with Kansas City Power & Light Co. (KCP&L) and American Century Investments. Camera's at two sites show eggs in nests and falcon parents tending them. Live streaming video offers the public a chance to watch falcon parents hatch eggs and feed young.

A camera is focused on a nest box mounted high on a smokestack at KCP&L's Iatan Power Plant north of Weston. Three eggs are visible in the nest, said Joe DeBold, MDC urban wildlife biologist. To view that nest, visit new.livestream.com/accounts/8268653/events/3883686.

Falcons are tending three eggs in a nest at the American Century tower near the Country Club Plaza in Kansas City. That nest is viewable at ustream.tv/channel/kansas-city-plaza-falcon-cam.

Peregrine falcons were originally cliff-nesting raptors. They are endangered in Missouri. MDC began a restoration program by releasing falcons in Downtown Kansas City in 1991 at the Commerce Tower. Similar releases took place in other urban cities.

Besides the two nests featured online this spring, there is a nest on a smokestack at KCP&L's Hawthorne Power Plant and another at the company's Sibley Station plant. The longtime nest at Commerce Tower is still active but does not have a camera this year.

The streaming video offers a fascinating look at falcons preserving at a nest through all manner of weather. Falcon chicks take their first steps around the nest on camera. Later in summer, the chicks will fledge in flight away from the nest. Falcons are remarkable flyers and can snatch food prey such as pigeons out of the air with high-speed dives. But they're also touchingly devoted parents, and the proof is now visible on the streaming video.

For more information on peregrine falcon cameras and other watchable wildlife in Missouri, visit mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/wildlife-cameras.