Peregrines on Dover cliffs

Collingwood paid a visit to a Dover bird-dealer who specialised in collecting Peregrines from the Dover cliffs to sell for falconry.

Diary 22 May, 1900
I took train over to Dover where I visited the bird-dealer Chatwin. This man (and his father before him) has always done a fair trade by taking the young of the falcons that nest in the high chalk cliffs near this town and selling them at £1 a piece for hawking purposes. He had one young falcon in his shop when I visited him and a very fascinating little fellow he looked having the appearance of an exaggerated lady’s powder puff, being covered by the softest of down save where the feathers were sprouting in the wing and tail. When sleeping undisturbed it lay flat on the ground like the Norfolk plovers are said to do, but immediately raised itself when alarmed

          Chatwin told me that he thought he was going to have a good year with the falcons – last spring he only procured 5 (stones had fallen and destroyed some of the nesting sites, while many eggs were addled.) but the year before he got as many as 17. Five or six pairs breed annually and are looked after by the bird-catching men who descend the cliffs to rob them of their young; perhaps a single bird is left in a couple of nests to keep up the stock, otherwise all are taken.

           Several interesting stories Chatwin told me about the falcons; one that a female once struck his dog with such violence as to knock the animal almost senseless; this was done of course to drive it away from the nest. The same bird also stooped very close to his little girl and in parrying it off Chatwin accidentally broke the bird’s leg. Another that the falcon being shot, the tiercel continued to feed the fledglings until old enough to be taken.

Peregrines continued to nest on the Dover cliffs until they were eliminated during WW2 because of their predation on carrier pigeons. Recovery after the war was slow because of the impact of organochlorine pesticides, but they eventually returned and now thrive, happily unmolested.

Collingwood's interest in falconry did not extend beyond 1900.