Latest falcon chicks named in honor of retiring UIC leaders

UIC Chancellor Marie Lynn Miranda (left) and Provost Karen Colley hold falcon chicks. (Photo: Jenny Fontaine/UIC) Listen to story summary

UIC's two newest peregrine falcons, hatched in May on the 28th floor of University Hall, were recently welcomed to campus and named in honor of two retiring campus leaders.

The male and female chicks are the latest generation of the birds of prey that hatch annually on a ledge outside the offices of the chancellor and provost. The chicks were brought into the building for banding on June 12, about 24 days after they hatched.

The fluffy white fledglings were named in honor of retiring UIC Provost Karen Colley and Michael Ginsburg, who served as special advisor to the chancellor for student affairs.

Chancellor Marie Lynn Miranda said naming the birds in their honor was a way to keep these two longtime leaders at UIC.

"Both Karen and Michael have been such longstanding contributors to the university, and honoring those contributions also gives us reasons to look out the window and go, 'Hey, there's Ginsburg, and hey, there's Colley,' so they are still here with us," said Miranda.

Colley, who was present at the banding, held the female bird in her gloved hands as it squawked alongside the male chick before being returned outside. She said she was honored to be the bird's namesake.

Falcon chicks inside University Hall. Chancellor Marie Lynn Miranda (left) with Provost Karen Colley, who holds falcon chick. Mary Hennen and Dylan Maddox from the Field Museum band falcon chick.

Photos: Jenny Fontaine/UIC

"It feels really cool," said Colley, who then addressed the bird in her hands. "I feel like a momma, like I have a little baby."

Falcons were first sighted on the 28th floor around 1999 and have been born there each year, said Field Museum ornithologist Mary Hennen. A Falcon Cam livestreams their days. Last year's brood did not survive the avian flu.

Hennen and several colleagues from the museum placed small metal bands on the birds' talons and took samples of their blood to monitor their health and movement. The leg bands have unique numbers for each bird. They provide data on peregrine survival, dispersal distances and population growth.

Hennen has been involved with falcons for 38 years. From the early 1950s until the late 1980s, there were no peregrine falcons in Illinois, she said. In 1986, they were reintroduced in the state, and one made its home on the roof of University Hall that same year.

"The first reintroduction in Illinois took place on your roof," Hennen said.

Bucket list

Brittany Conway (left) and Chancellor Marie Lynn Miranda with newly banded falcon chick. Falcon chicks on their ledge outside University Hall. The peregrine falcon mother flies outside University Hall.

Photos: Jenny Fontaine/UIC

Brittany Conway had the opportunity to hold a chick at the banding, too. She was representing the Bedford Falls Foundation, founded by her father-in-law Bill Conway Jr., which provides scholarships to UIC College of Nursing students. Brittany Conway said UIC's leadership in the peregrine falcon's reintroduction is impressive.

"This is amazing. I think it's incredible for the chancellor to get the Field Museum involved and keep this up. It's a very important thing to do," she said.

Also present were Bruno Pasquinelli, a major donor to the College of Medicine, and Christine Schwartz, an alum and a major donor to the College of Nursing. Schwartz was seeing the process for the first time, even though another chick from a brood several years earlier had been named in her honor.

"I thought that was one of the coolest gifts ever," said Schwartz. "It's just one of the most fun experiences ever. It was on my bucket list. This was a great, great honor.

"The university is a very caring institution, and it's not only to humans and students," she added. "It's to wildlife."