Chick flicks

Center-STAGE right now in the Internet spotlight are George and Gracie, a mating pair of peregrines raising four chicks on a 33rd floor ledge of the Pacific Gas and Electric Co. building in downtown San Francisco. They are one of an estimated 300 breeding pairs in California, a spectacular comeback for a bird that was nearly extinct in 1970. A webcam tucked out of sight behind the slats of a ventilation shaft monitors their nest.

“You can see the whole process, from laying the eggs and hatching and raising the chicks to the time they leave the nest, all without disturbing them,” says Janet Linthicum, a wildlife biologist with the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group, whose breeding and release program was influential in saving the falcons in California. The bird research group oversees the webcam, which is funded with a $30,000 grant from PG&E.;

San Francisco lawyer Neil Morse first noticed the adult falcons in 2002 as they courted and mated in front of his office in a downtown high rise. He alerted the Santa Cruz group, which gave him naming rights. Morse considered numerous famous partnerships before choosing the Burns and Allen comedy team for their legendary devotion.

Anyone with access to the Internet can watch the aerie. George and Gracie fans saw Gracie lay her clutch of four eggs between March 3 and 10, counted as the chicks began emerging April 11, and now watch them eat, sleep and grow.

Over on the PG&E; Falcons message board on Yahoo, an impassioned group of Internet falconers comment on the birds’ every move. They revel in the baby falcons’ growth and worry about their well-being. Messages that include “George just brought Gracie breakfast in bed,” “The chick in the back didn’t get any food!” and “Is the chick nearest the camera dying?” reveal sensibilities steeped in the warm and fuzzy world of Disney and the theatrical savagery of “Jaws.”

As avian Internet stars, George and Gracie are in good company. Experts with the Cornell Ornithology Lab estimate about 1,000 webcams worldwide are trained on a dizzying variety of nesting birds. When George and Gracie’s young leave the nest next week, bereft birders can switch to the live streaming video of a falcon nesting on -- appropriately -- the Rachel Carson State Office Building in Harrisburg, Pa.

“Falcons are the fastest bird on Earth -- clocked at more than 200 miles an hour,” says Glenn Stewart, a founding member of the Santa Cruz bird group. “Who wouldn’t find that fascinating?”

You can watch the San Francisco falcons at www.scpbrg.org and the Harrisburg falcons at www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/falcon.

-- Veronique de Turenne