Public Can Now Watch Alcatraz Island Falcons On New Webcam

Anyone who wants to check out the chicks of a nesting pair of peregrine falcons on Alcatraz Island can now do so via a new public webcam set up on the island, the National Park Service and Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy announced.

The inspiration for the webcam at www.parksconservancy.org/FalconCam, as well as one of the falcons themselves, came across the Bay at UC Berkeley.

A female falcon named Annie has lived since 2016 atop the Campanile bell tower on campus and the Cal Falcons group of scientists and volunteers monitor her nest via webcams and share images, videos and other information about the birds on social media.

One of Annie’s chicks that hatched in 2018 was dubbed Lawrencium in a naming contest by the Cal Falcons group in honor of an element discovered by the UC Berkeley campus and Lawrencium eventually flew out on her own and made her nest on Alcatraz, where the National Park Service has monitored her with a mate since at least 2020. Park service officials say they are the first peregrine falcons to nest there in recorded history.

Lawrencium, who was banded by UC officials when she was born, and her unbanded male companion recently welcomed four chicks and the park service had a webcam set up to capture and share images and video but it was not yet equipped to broadcast online.

“This all started as a ‘what if’ when I was watching the Cal Falcons webcam, wondering ‘how cool would it be to have a livestream of the Alcatraz falcon nest?’. I’m thrilled this became a reality thanks to all the collaborators from the NPS and the Parks Conservancy who helped see this through to the end,” Alcatraz Island biologist Lidia D’Amico said.

The webcam will provide high-definition images day and night of the nest and will show bird behaviors like the falcons preying on many other bird species since they are the apex predators on the island, according to the park service.

Meanwhile, Lawrencium has some new falcon siblings across the Bay since Annie and a new mate named Archie just saw four new falcon chicks of their own hatch on the Campanile last week. UC Berkeley held a Hatch Day event April 24 at the Berkeley Art Museum and Film Archive to celebrate the new arrivals.