BBC Snippets

Link: http://www.freelists.org/archives/bristol-birds/02-2008/msg00010.html

March 6, 1938 Among the special egg sets in the East Tennessee State University Biology Department's specimen collections is what modern day birders and ornithologists believe may be the last documented nesting of the Peregrine Falcon (Duck Hawk of old) in Northeast Tennessee or Southwest Virginia.

The eggs are known as the Robert B. Lyle collection, given to ETSU in the early '70s by the Johnson City resident who collected them over a 40-year period when collecting eggs was a hobby among some naturalist.

Lyle (1888-1971), in his years of failing health, had become a close friend of Wallace Coffey who often visited with him in his home and corresponded with him while in a VA hospital in North Carolina. The two spent many days and long hours talking about egg collecting, localities and birding records of the region.

Coffey had a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service scientific collecting permit for birds, eggs and such. He also held state permits for Tennessee and Virginia. Since Coffey was the only person in the region, outside of a university or qualified museum, who could legally take and possess the eggs. Lyle gave the collection to Coffey on a promise that it would eventually be moved to a teaching collection somewhere in the region.

Coffey's inventory of the collection found it contained 2,776 eggs in 641 clutches (egg sets) contained in 566 boxes. A 1972 inventory by Dr. Jerry Nagel reported 3,092 eggs in 637 clutches, representing 392 species.

In addition, Lyle gave Coffey many color slides of birds, photo albums of bird's nest and eggs and, at his death, left him his personal nature library.

The now famous photo of the Peregrine nest is only owned as copies by a handful of people who have prints given in honor of their contribution to regional ornithology and bird study.


One original is known to exist. The 8X10 was given to Rick Knight for his work with area bird records and his hacking of Peregrines, both at Roan Mountain and in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Coffey owns what appears to be a 4X5 and a 5X7 copy of the original which has the personal notes made by Lyle both on the face and on the back of the black and white print.

Lyle, and his birding companion, Bruce P. Tyler (1874-1975) of Johnson City, are believed to be the first bird photographers in the Mountain Empire Region.

Also among Lyle's photo collection is one of the great Devil's Looking Glass on the Nolichucky River just downstream from the I-26 bridge at Erwin in Unicoi County, TN.


His ink notes on the back say:

"nesting site of Duck Hawk 'Devil's Looking Glass' Unicoi Co., Tennessee" The same information appears at the bottom of the photo on the front. This photo was pasted in an album of his bird pictures and he may have added that information on the front so it could be seen. However, the ink notes on the back are still in good shape and very clear after having been removed from the pages. A second photo is looking down on the nest.

In this second photo two people can be seen below. Both of these pictures appear to have been made the same day or same season.


Some of the details on the back have been damaged from removing this print from the album. It apparently says that this is a photo looking down from above the nest but words which are clear and easily read:

".....river from 'Devils Looking Glass' directly above nest of Duck Hawk"

Lyle told Coffey (Bristol Herald Courier, Mar 7, 1971, p 8 that he well remembered the Slaughter's Bluff nest in of March 6, 1938, on the South Fork Holston River in Sullivan Co.

"It was a beautiful day and it had been cold just like in the past few days and the snow had melted," he remembered. "We had discovered the nest by throwing pebbles over a ledge where we thought she had her nest and the falcon flew out. It was about ten or 12 feet down and I went over on a rope ladder. There I found a nest depression scratched out in the dirt and the eggs were beautiful. They were cream colored and had specks all over them that gave an almost brick red color. There was a rock overhang that practically covered the nest to protect the eggs. The ground wasn't sandy but more like clay where the depression was made."

Lyle went on to explain that "these were the last eggs and the last nest ever found in the region as far as I know."

While Coffey has not found a location on maps of a locality called Slaughter's Bluff in Sullivan Co., he did learn from Lyle that the nest was in the cliff face where Patrick Henry Lake is today. It is now known as Dorn's Bluff. That cliff face is south facing and just upstream from the I-81 bridge over the S.F. Holston River ( Patrick Henry Lake). He also collected eggs of the Black Vulture from holes in that cliff.

In The Migrant for June 1933, F. M. Jones, describes two nests examined by himself and R. B. Lyle, the finder, near Johnson City, Tenn. B. P. Tyler of that city, wrote to Albert F. Ganier that "a third pair has been located on Roan Mountain." The Peregrines were nesting all through the North Carolina mountains and Sprunt and Murray, in The Auk (1930, p. 563) recorded seven of them on August 1, 1930, from the top of Grandfather Mountain, Avery Co., North Carolina.

Jones wrote in the December, 1933, The Migrant, page 43, that pairs are known in the Johnson City area and "have been visited by myself." He credits Lyle with finding them. The first was in an area found to be inaccessible due to a tremendous overhang of the steep rock cliffs. The second pair of located by Lyle on "April 2nd of this year-1933". They went to the site on April 5, 1933 and found birds present. Finally Jones returned April 14th. He went over the cliffs and found one egg in the hole which the hawk had rounded out. They went back on the 22nd and there was still just one egg.

Three weeks later (May 14) they returned and saw the male present. The rocks at that particular spot were well whitened with excrement. Jones went down on a rope to the nesting ledge and found a set of three eggs. The nest was on a flat ledge 24 inches broad, the female hawk flew around constantly, making a considerable fuss, and at one time coming in very close. Jones collected the eggs which proved to be perfectly fresh, and measured as follows: 2.25x1.74, 2.17x1.80, and 2.12x1.74. Jones signed the published note in 1933 stating that his residence was Independence, Va.

FOOT NOTE: The Lyle egg collection, was stored at Coffey's home in Bristol for more than a year. Many of the eggs were studied there by Dan W. Anderson, a graduate student from the University of Wisconsin, who used the raptor eggs to determine their egg shell thickness. Many of the eggs were prior to the use of DDT and the measurements were used to establish a "control." Anderson flew to Tri-City Airport and spent the day of March 1, 1968 with Coffey and the collection taking measurements of the egg shell thickness and egg weights. With Dr. Joseph J. Hickey (author of Peregrine Falcon Population, 1969) Anderson published Chlorinated Hydrocarbons and Eggshell Changes in Raptorial and Fish-Eating Birds (Science 11 October 1968: Vol 162, pp 271-273). Their paper: Eggshell changes for certain North American birds, 1972, Proceedings of the International Ornithological Congress 15:514-540, followed.

from the archives of the Bristol Bird Club