JACKSON, MI — High above downtown Jackson, four peregrine falcon chicks are growing fast and preparing for the day, not long from now, they'll take their first flights.

First, they need names!

Readers

for the four chicks (

). We want you to vote for your favorites.

The fine folks in Jackson County government, who provide a home for the falcons up on the County Tower Building, have agreed to let MLive readers select the names through a poll.

Last week, county information technology director Connie Frey and I winnowed the list of suggestions down to 16 names. We didn't want to make the poll unwieldy, and we tried to pick names that had some local relevance or just sounded interesting.

Now comes the fun part, but with a wrinkle. We don't yet know the sex of the chicks, so we are offering male, female and unisex names in the poll. Choose your favorites — as many as you want, as often as you want — and they'll be assigned later.

The birds' sexes will be determined when they are banded by state wildlife officials in early June. If, say, the first bird is determined to be male, officials will look for the top vote-getter in this poll with a male name. At that point, of course, we'll let you know the birds' names!

For now, start voting and spread the word. Make your case in the comments section for which name is the best, too. Vote as often as you like through the end of the day Thursday. Have fun!