{"id":300904,"date":"2026-10-06T16:02:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T16:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/300904\/"},"modified":"2026-10-06T16:02:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T16:02:14","slug":"for-25-years-cathedral-has-offered-a-home-on-high-for-peregrine-falcons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/300904\/","title":{"rendered":"For 25 years, Cathedral has offered a home on high for peregrine falcons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A falcon flying near the top of a building\" data-entity-type=\"file\" data-entity-uuid=\"cc03c779-bd51-4ea5-bad5-3d8a5277652a\" data-image-style=\"pittmag_fullwidth\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/20250521_ta_falcon-banding_0453_1100x740.jpg\" typeof=\"foaf:Image\" class=\"image-style-pittmag-fullwidth\"\/><br \/>\nPhotography by Tom Altany\/University of Pittsburgh<\/p>\n<p>The following first appeared in the Fall 2026 issue of Pitt Magazine as part of a collection of anecdotes, fun facts, figures and more \u2014 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pittwire.pitt.edu\/magazine\/features-articles\/2026\/09\/15\/cathedral-of-learning-fun-facts\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">42 of them in all, one for each of the Cathedral of Learning\u2019s 42 floors<\/a>. The issue celebrated the centennial of the Cathedral\u2019s 1926 groundbreaking.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>About 25 years ago, two endangered peregrine falcons found their way to a home atop the University of Pittsburgh\u2019s Cathedral of Learning.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"The words \" cathedral=\"\" of=\"\" learning=\"\" and=\"\" the=\"\" number=\"\" flanked=\"\" by=\"\" a=\"\" sketch=\"\" building=\"\" data-entity-type=\"file\" data-entity-uuid=\"80ba4531-f1bc-4407-a3fe-f5ba199881bb\" data-image-style=\"unrestricted\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1791302534_57_cathedral100_main_royalgold_325w_0-copy.jpg\" typeof=\"foaf:Image\" class=\"image-style-unrestricted\"\/><br \/>\nAs Pitt looks back on the September 1926 groundbreaking of the Cathedral of Learning, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cathedral100.pitt.edu\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">check out additional stories, photos, a timeline and more<\/a> from the now century-old history of the University&#8217;s campus in the sky.<\/p>\n<p>No longer nesting in Pennsylvania as of the 1960s, peregrines began to repopulate the state in later decades, though still with an uncertain future. Fond of extremely high perches for nesting, surveying their territory and spotting the songbirds they prey upon, falcons had successfully nested and raised chicks among the skyscrapers of downtown Pittsburgh as early as 1991.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But downtown wasn\u2019t an ideal habitat; construction activity would disrupt the falcons\u2019 nesting area on the Gulf Tower, leading them to abandon that nest by 2017 and never return.<\/p>\n<p>One day in January 2001, a passionate birder named Kate St. John spotted two falcons in courtship flight, circling the lofty heights of the Cathedral. She notified the Pennsylvania Game Commission, the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy and the University of Pittsburgh.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The partners came together and installed a nesting box in 2002. In recent years, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pittwire.pitt.edu\/features-articles\/2026\/05\/28\/peregrine-falcon-banding-cathedral-learning\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Pitt has collaborated with the National Aviary<\/a> on Pittsburgh\u2019s North Side to maintain a webcam trained on the Cathedral nest box around the clock during the nesting season.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOver the years, Pitt has been an ideal host for a falcon nesting site,\u201d St. John says. \u201cLook at this building &#8230; You can literally see for miles from up there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photography by Tom Altany\/University of Pittsburgh The following first appeared in the Fall 2026 issue of Pitt Magazine&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[73,75,74],"class_list":["post-300904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}