Falcon-cam at University of Montreal captures first hatchling

One of the highlyanticipatedstars of the University of Montreal's livefalcon-camhas made itsfirst appearance.

After 40 days of incubation, one of the chickshatched Tuesday night. Three more chicks are expected to hatch in the next few days.

• On mobile? Watch the live falcon-cam here

The birds have their own Facebook page with more than 3,000 likes.

Spirit, the female falcon, has been nesting at the University of Montreal since 2009.

Record year

This has been a record year forperegrine falconnests in Montreal.

Nests have been found on several bridges, the TurcotInterchange, the Stock Exchange tower and in the silo at the corner of Viauand Notre-Dame.

A pair has even taken up residence on a ledge at St-Marc church on the corner of Beaubien Street and 2nd Avenue.

Most of the birds are marked with a leg band, allowing researchers to track their whereabouts. Many of them are Spirit's offspring.

The species is slowly recovering after being decimated by the use ofthe insecticideDDTin the '50s and '60s. It was eventuallybanned in Canada in 1972, but the damage to the falcon population had already been done.

In the 1980s and 90s, 256 captive-bred falcons were released in Quebec.

To date, there areonly 50 non-captive pairs in the province and the species is still classified as vulnerable.