Now there is concern that nests in remote areas may have been tampered with. Not overtly, but covertly, in ways that would be difficult to detect.


There is no hard evidence yet but suspicions range from keeping the parent birds off the eggs in wet weather by being too close to the nest, to abseiling down to cliff nesters and pricking the eggs.


So who is against the peregrine and why? There has not been a time for 200 years that these masters of the skies have been so common as now.
Racing pigeons are taken by peregrines but the predation of these birds is not high. Forty per cent of racing pigeons, in the past decade, do not make it home, in some areas.


Fanciers, however, do not blame the peregrine. Many of their birds are simply getting lost. The birds are nowadays more easily losing their way and the worry is that mobile radios are somehow confusing the navigation systems in the pigeons' brains.


The spread of mobiles has coincided with pigeon losses. Pigeons race in tight flocks and in crossing through a peregrine territory would result in the loss of only one bird in a flock of 50 pigeons.


For full feature see West Sussex Gazette August 20