Where Do Falcons Typically Live?
Falcons are birds of prey that live virtually worldwide. Of the nearly 60 species of falcons, the peregrine falcon is the most widely distributed species. This is fitting, considering the bird’s scientific name, Falco peregrinus, means “pilgrim falcon” in Latin.
Peregrine falcons live on every continent except Antarctica. Strong and fast—the fastest animal in the world, actually—they have adapted to many different climates and habitats. Peregrines can be found everywhere from rocky open country near water, where they like to nest on high ledges on cliffs, to urban areas, where they nest on skyscrapers and bridges.
Gyrfalcons (F. rusticolus), the world’s largest falcons, live in the Arctic, although a few populations breed in Central Asian highlands. Like peregrines, gyrfalcons use cliff faces as nesting sites, although they occasionally live in tree nests abandoned by ravens. Merlins (F. columbarius) are small falcons found at high latitudes throughout the Northern Hemisphere, including Canada and the United States, the British Isles, Iceland, and Russia. During most of the year, merlins inhabit open country ranging from marshlands to deserts, but many breed in conifer and birch woods. In open country they lay their eggs in a scrape on the ground amid bushes, but in forested areas they use the tree nests of crows, rooks, or magpies.
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The colorful Aplomado falcon (F. femoralis) lives in grasslands, with a range from southeast Texas and New Mexico in the United States, where it’s endangered, to Tierra del Fuego in Argentina.
The bat falcon (F. albigularis) is a species that lives in Mexico and Central and South America, and the forest falcon (Micrastur semitorquatus) of tropical America lives in the jungles, where it hunts other birds and reptiles. Also found in Central and South America, in the wooded lowlands, is a noisy brown bird known as the laughing falcon (Herpetotheres cachinnans). Falcons of the desert include the prairie falcon (F. mexicanus), which inhabits canyon and scrub country in western North America.
