2023 was another record-breaking year for Madison Audubon’s Kestrel Nest Box Monitoring Program. With 228 boxes spread over 12 counties, these small, but fierce, falcons had plenty of cavities to choose from.
Photo by Madison Audubon
2022 American Kestrel Monitoring and Banding: It Took a Village
Kestrel Nest Box Program 2021
Many records were set in our 2021 Kestrel Nest Box Monitoring program that included 208 nest boxes monitored by 65 volunteers and three banders. Roughly 232 young birds fledged, 160 young were banded, and 41 adults were captured.
Photo by Andy Reago & Chrissy McClarren
Madison Audubon's Kestrel Nest Box Program - 2020 Update
Helping the American kestrel increase its numbers and providing data to the American kestrel Partnership has all the qualities of a good citizen science project for Madison Audubon. Madison Audubon’s volunteers began directly helping kestrels in 1985 when Mark, Sue, and volunteer Greg Geller began erecting kestrel nest boxes at Goose Pond around 1985. The kestrel nest box project really started to take off in 2009 with a coordinator (me) assigned to the project, and then again in 2012 when Mark and Sue ask me to check the nest boxes using a spy camera, a major advancement in the efficiency and effectiveness of monitoring.
Photo by Phil Brown
Featured Sanctuary Bird: American Kestrel
North America’s littlest falcon, the American Kestrel is our Friday Feathered Feature. This colorful, acrobatic bird is exciting to watch in action - Kestrels are often found perching on wires or power lines, watching for prey. You can see one for yourself on North Shore road at ourFaville Grove Sanctuary near Lake Mills.
