Monday, January 15, 2018

Cat Stairs and Falcon Cliffs (Part 2 of 2)




On our November trip to the Cat Stairs of Greenbrier Pinnacle, Greg Harrell and I approached the base of the cliffs in a steep, dry, boulder-filled ravine. After about an hour in the ravine, we decided to hop over onto the adjacent, rocky ridge that had plenty of exposed, broken rock walls and spines that would provide some fun rock scrambling, which they did. These were fairly typical rocky ridges which usually are not dangerous, just challenging. Although, on this and other similar ridges, there are usually a few places where, if you fell just right, you could break your neck, but the more likely outcome would probably be just a broken femur or tibia. In that respect, they’re no different than the stairs in your house. Just don’t fall and you’ll be fine.  



This small, wooded side ridge led to the base of the cliffs, at which point we went right (south) toward our favorite lunch spot in the park – a nice little nook with a roof and walls and a panoramic view of Mount LeConte across the Greenbrier valley. We bushwhacked along the base of the cliffs, below the Falcon Cliffs, to one of the two massive cuts in the cliff that lead to the top. There’s a challenging little scramble along the edge of this cut in the cliffs that leads to our secret nook, which we’ve named The Best Lunch Spot… because that’s what it is. From here we have a good view across toward Falcon Cliffs.



The name “Falcon Cliffs” is significant. Peregrine Falcons disappeared from the park in the 1940s or 50s as their numbers dwindled due to toxic pesticides in use at the time. In the 1980s the Park Service tried to reintroduce these falcons back into the park, so they closed the Greenbrier Pinnacle trail and set up a falcon “hacking” program (i.e., resettling pairs of falcons near the cliffs, hoping they would re-establish themselves), but the falcons didn’t stay and nest. However, in the 1990s a pair from somewhere found their way to the cliffs near Alum Cave and have been nesting there ever since. Sometime later a pair settled in the Charlies Bunion area, but still not on Greenbrier Pinnacle.



Then in March, 2013, Greg and I made an early spring trip to the Cat Stairs and were stunned when we heard a falcon’s screech. Once we got into the cliffs and had an unobstructed view from our Best Lunch Spot, we were able to see one, then two falcons sweeping and soaring along the cliffs and over the top of the Pinnacle. After they had finished showing off their aerial gyrations, they did something that hadn’t been done in decades – they both landed in a little crack in the cliffs of Greenbrier Pinnacle. And they stayed. And they chased away several ravens and hawks. The little crack was their new home – “Falcon Cliffs” was born.



Greg and I went back several times that spring, and the two falcons were always there, in that same spot – a crack in the cliffs, with a small pine tree clinging tenaciously to a nearby ledge. We never heard or saw babies, but it certainly looks as if the Peregrine Falcons have returned – permanently – to Greenbrier Pinnacle. In each subsequent spring we returned, and yes, the falcons were still there, acting like they owned the place, which is exactly what you want to see because a “territorial” falcon is usually a nesting falcon.



We didn’t expect to see the falcons on this November trip, and we didn’t. I’ve been told the park’s falcons usually don’t migrate, but merely hunker down during the cold months. Can’t say that I blame them because that’s pretty much what I do, too. Every winter I stay here in East Tennessee, but I don’t get out a lot… except in November, when the sun is shining on the ice in the treetops, and the sky is a deep, deep blue, and the temperatures are hovering right around freezing. I know the short, dark, cold days of winter are coming soon, but on a day like today, they seem a thousand years away.