A validated forensic STR profiling method for the Peregrine Falcon (Falco peregrinus) to identify individuals and investigate familial relationships.

Falconry, and the captive breeding of Peregrine Falcons (Falco peregrinus) and their hybrids is a thriving industry in both the UK and the Middle East, with thousands of birds traded internationally on an annual basis. Wild Peregrine Falcons, having suffered a population collapse in the 1960s, are protected by UK legislation and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna (CITES) lists Peregrines on Appendix I, which restricts international trade in these birds. As such, in the UK, captive-bred birds must be registered within a few weeks of hatching and birds sold internationally require an export permit which involves a legal declaration stating the identities of the parent birds. Between 2007 and 2025 there has been a 60-fold increase in export permit applications from the UK, and a concern was raised that this could in part be due to illegal theft of wild Peregrine Falcons being falsely claimed as captive bred. To facilitate compliance checks of captive breeding records, we have developed and validated a 5-multiplex short-tandem-repeat (STR) panel comprised of 21 STR markers and a sexing marker, which can reliably identify individual Peregrines (P(ID) 6.511 × 10-19) and determine parentage and other close familial relationships (P(ID)PP 1.009 × 10-10 and P(ID)sib 6.000 × 10-8). This panel, along with the development of a DNA database of wild UK Peregrines, has been successfully implemented in the UK to support both the regulation of the captive falconry trade and specific law enforcement investigations into the laundering of wild birds.