Incredible moments for the Life Lanner project!

The first 3 young lanners included in the hacking of this 2024 season have started to make their first movements around the release area. A few hundred meters for Carlotta and Calogero, who then spend most of their time in the area around the box, while Camilla, the first individual born in our center this year, gave us an unforgettable experience!

Last Thursday when we arrived Camilla was not in the area, as also confirmed by the receiver which did not give any signal. In the following days, through GPS points, we discovered the reason: like most young falcons, she had left for an exploration tour… a very extensive one! We were ready to move, as had already happened in the past on other occasions, for a possible recovery, given his inexperience outside the area in which he had flown up to that point.

We remotely followed its movements towards southern Italy, from Campania, then passing through Basilicata, until arriving in Puglia, when on the third day it started to move back north. Arriving in Abruzzo, on the fourth day after her departure, she crossed the Apennines to arrive very close to the area from which she left, about 10 km as the crow flies. A flutter of wings, compared to the almost 1500 km traveled in 5 days! But when we went to check on his health, now close to “home”, we unfortunately found that his transmitter showed a low battery.

GPS can provide us with very useful data on the movements of animals, but only the radio telemetry system allows us to intercept them until we can reach them at any time, should they need our help. For this reason, even if seeing it arrive at the hacking area would have been an amazing result, we preferred to recover it so as not to run any risks. If she hadn’t gone back to the hacking box and the transmitter stopped working, we probably would have lost her.
At just over two months old, even if they have started to muscle up and make flights worthy of being called such, they are little more than nestlings, and at this stage their parents still support them in feeding and refining their techniques hunting: in a controlled environment the learning phase lasts much longer, for the simple fact that human beings cannot totally replace the natural process of another species.

However, we have the opportunity to improve our methods so that young people, once free, may be able to provide food for themselves and choose a territory suitable for them in which to settle.
Over time we have had the opportunity to experience first-hand the difficulties of a successful and long-lasting insertion into nature, especially working on such small numbers of such a vulnerable species; Such events are a source of great pride for us, and allow us to see in every small action a further step towards safeguarding the lanner.