Issue Two
Meet the Residents
Amidst the piercing calls of the resident birds at Hawk Creek Wildlife Rehabilitation in East Aurora, New York, the owner/founder Loretta Jones educates. The residents include recuperating raptors, the educational eagles, owls, hawks, and a three-legged otter–a victim of a trap.
Loretta banishes some urban myths. "No, porcupines do not shoot their needles." Loretta laughs.
"They only do that in cartoons." Matt the volunteer pipes in.
"Yes, you can put a baby bird back in the nest once you have touched it. It’s amazing how ingrained that myth is." Loretta shakes her head.
"Yes, there are bob cats in these parts." Molly, another volunteer tells me.
Loretta blames humans for the entrenchment of these myths and mistaken beliefs. "We must learn to think again. Toss the calculator and the computer and try to figure things out ourselves. We are creating a society that doesn’t want to think. You would be amazed what you can learn from simply observing the animals."
Retch is the name given to the resident Turkey Vulture at Hawk Creek. He throws up when he feels threatened or scared. (Not a bad survival technique.) Retch is a homely looking bird. His head is a bald red wrinkled piece of skin. Loretta insists he can hear and I tell Retch, from a safe distance, how lovely he is.
Loretta gives another lesson, "He eats inside the cavities of dead and diseased things, that’s why his head is bald. When he dips in, he doesn’t want to pick any diseases up." You have to love evolution–keep your head clean and life goes on.
There are three eagles in another cage. Each with suspicious eyes. Canyon, is the Golden Eagle who was hit by an airplane in Utah. He is permanently disabled and now makes use of his time educating people of the plight of his species.
"Another re-habber in Utah sent him to us because space to keep these birds is so limited. Thanks to my being able to expand the center, I was able to provide him a home." Loretta explains.
The other two eagles are the familiar national symbol the great Bald Eagle. Poachers in Oklahoma shot one. His name, One Wing tells all.
"Why would someone just shoot him while he was sitting on a telephone pole?" Loretta asks, still astonished after all these years. Why indeed? A car in Virginia hit another. Again, both states had no place to house these beautiful creatures and so they asked Hawk Creek for accommodations. There are problems with placing injured eagles because they live up to 55 years of age thus many re-habilitators cannot afford to keep them around.
"Bald Eagles are indigenous to here," Loretta explains. "Three bald eagles were shot in Western New York last year. Permanently disabled. How many can we take in? If they are permanently disabled because of us, do we put them down? We need to educate the people who feel a need to shoot them, to stop shooting them."
Loretta opens the door to the home of two young bobcats. "These two were rescued from a pet store. They were living in a store window for three years. People were tapping on the glass and the owner of the store purchased them with hopes of breeding. Can you imagine ‘breeding’ in a store window?"
As she enters the cage I ask, "Aren’t you afraid of them turning on you? They are still wild animals..."
"No, I am afraid of man turning on me." She answers.
She further recites a quote from the humane society, "Every now and then we need to be reminded that man is the most dangerous animal on the planet."
The Harris Hawk seems angry with anyone who stands in front of his cage.
"He’s jealous that you’re out here with me." Loretta laughs. Harris Hawks are called the wolves of birds. They are intelligent and work in packs. One bird will chase a rabbit out from one end of something while another waits at the other end. They then eat their prey together.
Loretta tells how the Hawks have great senses of humor. "They used to put rocks above the door and when we opened the door, the rocks would fall on our head and they would scrunch down in the corner and laugh at us."
The Falcon Patrol from St. Louis have their own enclosure to fly around in. These two majestic raptors were trained at the St. Louis air force base to scare seagulls away from airplanes.
"Isn’t that a wonderful natural idea? Instead of using poison, they used nature." Loretta is pleased at this solution to the problem of birds and planes.
"When these guys fly, the birds disappear because they know the Peregrine Falcon is coming. It’s so natural to use this brilliant creature. Unfortunately, one of them has a genetic problem, a defected wing. He’s not one hundred percent so he didn’t make the patrol. Fortunately, he has found a home here."
These animals are used for training purposes and cannot be introduced to the wild. They are crippled either physically or mentally. They are crippled mentally because someone took them out of their nest or found them at a very young age and raised them. This causes unnatural imprinting when the birds become dependent on humans as their only food providers.
While all that Hawk Creek accomplishes is important to the lives of the animals, the message that Loretta wants to stress is how people need to become aware of how brutal the human element is to the planet.
"It became more and more obvious to me as I went along that we are hurting ourselves. People give to cancer research, and they should, but they should also stop doing things that cause the cancer. I don’t see a great movement to clean up the environment? Man does not want to be inconvenienced–we seem to be missing the connection. Hawk Creek’s mission is focused on a bigger issue–the planet. At Hawk Creek, we use the animals to educate. It seems that people simply do not listen to one another. Well, maybe they will listen to the animals."
You are invited to send a donation, and/or inquire about becoming a volunteer at Hawk Creek. You are urged to help save the planet.
To contact the Hawk Creek Rehabilitation Center:
Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, Inc.
P.O. Box 662
East Aurora, New York, 14052
1.716.652.8646