Summary of the 2022 season

The Derby Cathedral Peregrine Project, managed by the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust, has now been running for 17 years! 

Here's a look back at last summer's events at the Cathedral, written by two members of the project team: Nick Moyes - who co-founded the project (with Nick Brown) back in 2006 and Alice Smith, a trainee with the Wildlife Trust, who  joined us just for the 2022 breeding season.

Nick M, who does all the IT /web cam and abseiling side of things, wrote: 

At the cathedral, the female laid early – with the first egg appearing on 9th March 2022.
A month later three of the four eggs hatched and the chicks were ringed on 6th May.

          The juveniles grow to full size in six weeks! Photo D Farmer (gdfotos.co.uk)

By mid-May, the chicks were big enough to be seen from the ground and the Watch Point events on Derby's Cathedral Green, organised by Alice, could start.

For the whole of 2022 we had a count of 233,456 Unique Visits to the webcams. 
This comprises 170,924 'First Time' visits and 62,532 'Returning Visits'.

Alice now takes up the story. She wrote: 

The 2022 peregrine year has been one to remember! 
Ten watchpoints attracted over 200 people who came to watch our chicks grow and get into a bit of bother with two needing to be rescued. 

On  27th May, we got a call saying the chick had landed on the road.
Luckily we got him to safety and placed him back on top of the cathedral. 

                                  Alice with the fallen chick (ringed XJ). 

The next day, a worried member of the public came to tell us a peregrine had landed in the river! 

With quick thinking, Nick Moyes and his daughter Kathryn again rescued a second youngster and put him back on top of the tower. 
A few hours later, he jumped off the cathedral roof again, only to get tangled in a tree. 
He then made his way over to a nearby pub roof and, after being monitored there for some hours, was fine thereafter.

To get more people involved with our peregrines for the 2023 season, I have been giving talks across the county. I’ve engaged with over 900 people, including visiting Ukrainian summer camps and running assemblies at schools. In addition, Trust AGM attendees learnt about the Cathedral peregrines and saw the magnificent mural created on a wall nearby. 

Mural close to the Museum of Making on Cathedral Green. Photo by James Boon

It has been a pleasure for me to work with peregrines and to teach others about this exciting species! 

Looking back at the visitors to our webcams, Nick M. reports that the webcameras installed on the peregrine's nest platform were viewed 233,456 times during the season. Once the birds left the nest platform we see a sudden drop-off in visitors, though our blog and the cameras do remain active all year round.

On a personal note, we were deeply saddened by the sudden death in early 2022 of our stalwart ringer, Dave Budworth, but we welcome his mentee, Chloe Pritchard, who is now fully licenced and supportive of our project. Chloe ringed all three of this year's brood - two males and one female.

Here's looking forward to the 18th season!
The Project Team