The Unfixable Birds

In the late 80s, I volunteered at The Raptor Education Foundation in Colorado. REF houses and rehabilitates, as much as possible, raptors that are rescued from various situations but cannot be released back into the wild. This is due to permanent injuries or psychological injuries (such as imprinting). The trainable birds become ambassadors for their species in educational programs. The hope is that once people are educated about raptors, they will see them differently and reconsider harming one by raiding a nest or by shooting them (both of which are illegal). Raptors include eagles, hawks, falcons, and owls.

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Let me introduce you to Barny the Barn Owl, Beatrice the Saw-Whet Owl, and Brad the Red-Tailed Hawk, with guest mentions of Dorothy the Turkey Vulture, Diana the Great Horned Owl, and Julia the Golden Eagle.

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Barny, the Barn Owl, spots a new, very small owl being carefully released in the enclosure next to his. Once the humans have retreated, he introduces himself.

“Hello, hello! Hoo hoo! Saw-Whet, am I right? I’m Barny! What’s your name, little lady?”

The Saw-Whet looks around cautiously.

“I’m Beatrice. I think.”

“Welcome to the UnFixable Club, Beatrice. I don’t mean to be rude, but you look a bit rough. I’ve seen worse, though! If you wish, you’re welcome to tell me what happened.”

“From what I understand, Barny, I was hit by a train. Or ran into a train. Something about a train. It’s all muddled in my mind.”

“No way!”

“Yes, way. Way too close to that train.”

Barny peers at her more closely.

“Holy Smokes, you are tiny! No wonder you’re ruffled. And your right pupil is HUGE, even for an owl! No offense.”

“None taken. That must be why I can’t see out of that eye at all. And I have a monstrous headache.”

“That’s why you’re here, I bet. But there’s no need to fret. Hey! I made a poem! Let’s see…Don’t fret or be upset! Much attention you will get!”

Barny, who is quite pleased with himself, wiggles his tail feathers.

“If you don’t mind, Barny, I’d like some quiet and rest.”

“Oh. Sorry. That’s cool. You rest up now.”

Perching silently, they sit for a few moments, each in their own enclosure. But Barny is unable to contain himself.

“Hey, Beatrice!”

Beatrice squints at him.

“Yes?”

“I just want to tell you not to worry about a thing. I’ve been here almost my whole life, and it’s not so bad.”

“I can see that sleep is out of the question. So, Barny, why are you here?”

“It’s quite a story, let me tell you!”

He puts on his story-telling voice.

“‘The Adventures of One Smart Scrappy Fledging Barn Owl.’ Now, picture a leaning old barn and a nest of fluffy little cuties up in a corner. All eyes and feet they are, waiting for Mom to bring back some field mice. Then one of them feels a hand. Not a wing, but a HAND, Beatrice, A HUMAN HAND. A human hand picks up the angry little ball of fluff. And the one that got nabbed? Guess who that was! It was me! I bit and squawked, but it made no difference.”

Beatrice perks up. She’s anxious to hear what happened.

“Then what?”

“I’m taken far away to an enclosure that’s nothing like this and nothing like a barn either. The rooms and walls went on and on. The humans fed me what they called ‘hamburger.’ It tasted terrible, let me tell you! But I got used to it and them. They weren’t bad sorts, just ignorant. I was there for a long time, but then a smart human must have told the Owl Police I was there, and the humans had to give them a bunch of their money for something called a ‘fine,’ and then I came here.”

“But you’re ok though, Barny, right? I don’t see anything wrong with you, at least not with my good eye.”

“Ahhh, Bea, if I may call you Bea…”

“Of course.”

“Not being able to see what’s wrong with me is the tricky thing.”

Barny points to his head with a wingtip.

“My injury is in here where it can’t be seen. It’s um…psycho…psycho…logical! It’s psychological! I am an ‘Imprint.’”

Beatrice stares at Barny’s head.

“Can you explain, please?”

“Certainly. Because I was very young and I lived with the humans too long, they ‘imprinted’ on me. I thought the humans were my parents, but since they had never had a bird like me before, they couldn’t teach me how to hunt. And ever since because that happened….”

Barny’s voice trails off.

Beatrice edges closer on her perch to be nearer to Barny’s enclosure.

“And?”

Barny pauses.

“This is embarrassing.”

“Barny, you can tell me.”

“Please don’t judge me, Beatrice.”

“I promise I won’t.”

“Bea…I’m afraid of mice.”

“A barn owl afraid of mice? Really? I mean, I’m not judging you at all. I’ve just never heard of such a thing.”

“It’s true! Live mice freak me out because of the imprinting. I can’t help it, and I can’t change it.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that, Barny. What they did to you was wrong. Hmmm. But what do you eat if you don’t eat mice? Voles?”

“I still eat mice, Bea, but only post-living mice — that is, mice I didn’t catch myself. And no voles! I cannot stand anything that scampers and squeaks. I especially hate the squeaking. But the mice I get now are different from the ones you’re used to Out There. The mice the humans give us are white mice.”

Beatrice tries to envision white mice.

“White? I’ve never ever seen a white mouse. Where do they come from? A faraway place?”

“No, they are The Lab Mice.”

“What’s a lab?”

“I think it’s a place. The weird thing is that they come here all stuck together in a big frozen ball.”

“We get fed FROZEN mice? That’s not natural! I want out of here! Where’s the manager? I don’t care if I’m half blind — I’ll be fine!”

“Beatrice! Calm down! When they give the mice to us, they aren’t frozen. The humans unfreeze them in a box that beeps when they aren’t frozen anymore. Julia told me.”

“Who’s Julia? What box? I do not like this. This is a nightmare!”

“It’s all good, Beatrice, I swear! Let me explain. Julia is the Golden Eagle, and she’s a few enclosures down from us. She told me all about the beeping box. Julia has to go into what she says is The Office to get her beak coped.”

“Do I even want to know what ‘coped’ is?”

“Oh, it just means they trim her beak because it can get too long. She hates it but says they’re gentle about it.”

Barny pauses to let Beatrice absorb what he told her.

“So, in The Office there’s lots of noise and boxes and ringing and humans and long tubes that light up in the ceiling. One box spits out paper, like when we owls are hacking up the bones of a mouse, but with way more noise. Get this, once the Giant White Cold Humming Box lid was open when Julia was there. And you know what she saw? Frozen rabbits! And bunches of frozen balls of mice. When I heard that, I thought I’d love to taste a rabbit. Just a tiny taste.

Barny stops to savor the thought of a taste of rabbit. He continues.

“There’s a legend around here that there was once a prong-horned antelope in the Giant Humming Box. It had been hit by a roaring rolling metal thing that was hollow for the humans to sit in.”

“I wonder if it was a train!”

“I don’t think so, Bea. It wasn’t on a track like a train. Anyway, Dorothy, the turkey vulture, got that whole entire antelope. The humans called it ‘Occupational Therapy.’ I wouldn’t have minded a taste of that antelope either.”

Beatrice shivered because turkey vultures were massive, and even though she knew she wasn’t on their menu, she still didn’t want to be anywhere near one.

Concerned, she looks around and considers hopping into her nest box.

“When they brought me in here, I didn’t see a turkey vulture.”

“Don’t worry, Bea. Dorothy’s on the other end somewhere because she needs a lot of space. She’s gigantic. But that reminds me. She’s a legend.”

A voice from a nearby enclosure speaks up.

“Barny! Not that story again! I’ve heard that a dozen times! You need new material!”

“PUT A SOCK IN IT, BRAD! BEATRICE HASN’T HEARD IT YET!”

“WELL, I’M SICK OF IT! WHO DIED AND MADE YOU THE WELCOME WAGON ANYWAY?”

“WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT, BRAD? SQUEEZE THROUGH YOUR BARS AND BEAT ME WITH YOUR BAD WING?”

“HEY! AT LEAST I’M NOT AFRAID OF MICE!”

“LOW BLOW, BRAD, LOW BLOW.”

Beatrice looks around nervously.

“Um…Who is Brad, Barny?”

“Red-Tail Hawk, next door. He’s here because a farmer shot him for TRYING TO EAT HIS CHICKENS BECAUSE HE’S AN IDIOT!”

“ONE CHICKEN, BARNY, ONE LOUSY CHICKEN!”

“ONE WAS ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU A CRIPPLE, BRAD!”

Suddenly, there’s silence from Brad’s enclosure. Barny knows he’s gone too far.

“Brad? Oh, hey, Brad, I shouldn’t have made that cripple comment. It was mean, and I apologize, ok?”

“Ok, Barny. I didn’t mean what I said either.”

Barny notices that Beatrice is upset.

“I’m sorry you had to hear that, Beatrice. Me and Brad have spats all the time, but we always make up. Now, let me tell you about Dorothy the Turkey Vulture and her escape!”

“She escaped? Why is she still here then?”

“Beatrice, you’re getting ahead of the story. I need to build up to it.”

Barny ruffles, then smooths his feathers and puts his storytelling voice on again.

“The Escape of Dorothy and Her Almost Immediate Return. We begin our story with Dorothy escaping.”

“But HOW, Barny? How did she escape?”

Beatrice secretly feared that Dorothy would escape again and suddenly appear in her enclosure.

“I don’t know how she escaped, Beatrice, but she did. Maybe someone left her door unlatched. Maybe her human didn’t have Dorothy’s leash on, and she flew away when she was sunning. But that’s not the point!”

“Well, it’s in the title of your story.”

“Beatrice, I’m trying to make this dramatic, and how she escaped isn’t the point, so let me finish.”

Barny takes a deep breath for emphasis.

“Ok, Dorothy escapes, and she’s an imprint like me. She can fly great, but she doesn’t know what to look for or do, and she is getting hungry. She’s circling around and around, and suddenly, she gets a whiff of something tasty and looks down and sees construction workers eating their lunch outside at a table, minding their own business. That’s what Turkey Vultures are good at — smelling a meal from miles away! She lands right on the table because she thinks humans are her friends like they are here. Can you imagine?”

The image of Dorothy landing on the table makes Beatrice shudder.

“Dorothy grabs a sandwich with her big, scaly foot like she’s saying, ‘Well, hello there, humans. This looks tasty. Thank you kindly.’ The workers freak out and call the humans here where we live, and they recapture her and bring her home! What about THAT?”

“Good story. I do wish I knew how she escaped, though. I hope the humans are more careful now.”

“Beatrice, don’t fixate on that. You’ll be fine here, I promise. I know it’s not the same as being Out There. But, In Here, you get fed, and the humans are the best kind of humans and…wait, they’re coming! You can try a white mouse! And tomorrow, I’ll tell you about the time our humans were given the wrong mice for our dinner from The Lab. We ate those mice, and we all passed out! I call it ‘The Mighty Mix Up And The Morning After.’ You’ll love that story!”

“Wrong mice?”

Barny spoke slowly to make sure he got the explanation correct.

“Well, Diana the Great Horned Owl explained it to me. She’s an imprint, too. At The Lab, they have something called the Control Mice. The Control Mice don’t get the drugs that the other mice do. We’re supposed to get the control mice, but the lab mixed them up. It’s rather hysterical!”

“I’m sorry, Barny, but this whole thing about the poor mice sounds horrible!”

“Yeah, I agree that it’s sad and not the natural way, but that’s how we get fed. I mean, I wish I could be out there flying around and catching regular field mice, but I’m in here because of a few stupid humans. I guess that’s the way of things. The time we got the wrong mice freaked out the humans, though, because they came in the morning and saw us all lying around on the ground looking like we were dead. But we weren’t! We woke up after a while. Anyway, I told you my best story, and it made you feel bad. I’m sorry.”

Barny pauses, feeling slightly deflated and guilty. But then he perks up.

“Oh! Sometime I’ll tell you about how we get to ride in the special rolling metal machine to see more humans than you’ve ever seen in one spot. It’s a HOOT. Get it? A HOOT? Because we’re owls!”

“You’re funny, Barny, and sweet. Thank you for being so lovely to me.”

Brad gives a shout from his enclosure.

“HEY, BARNY BOY, LOOKS LIKE I’M GETTING A NICE JUICY RABBIT LEG. AND YOU’RE NOT!”

“SHUT UP BRAD! AND SAVE ME A NIBBLE! PLEASE?”

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For a while, Beatrice dreamed every night about her life Out There. But she soon relaxed into her new routine and even got used to humans cooing and saying “awwwww!” at her events.

Brad the Red Tail Hawk was too cantankerous for events, so he remained in his ample space, pampered and fed but never free. He was famous for pulling a live rabbit through the slats of his enclosure and having a feast large enough that he couldn’t fly up to his perch for hours.

Like all of the raptors, Barny The Barn Owl was always a big hit at events. The eagles were always crowd favorites, and the Harris Hawks were trained to fly over the crowd and land in front of a lucky, astounded kid.

Julia The Golden Eagle wowed the crowd with her six-foot wing span. (In general, female raptors are larger than the males.)

The story about the lab’s mice mixup is true, and thankfully, none of the raptors were seriously damaged by their experience.

The tiny Saw-Whet actually did have a run-in with a train. I was amazed at her survival and sad that she couldn’t live her life out in the wild.

The Raptor Education Foundation continues its efforts to educate the public about not harassing raptors. I recall that at one event for sportsmen, the head handler told the crowd that mice are responsible for destroying tons of grain in silos, thus endangering the beer supply. Raptors kill millions of rats and mice, thereby keeping the beer supply safe for the future. That information may have changed a few minds about the importance of the Kings and Queens of the skies. Check them out at the link below.

It’s been decades since I was there, and the birds I knew are long gone but never forgotten.

Please note, REF never names its birds because they don’t want people to think of them as pets. I named them solely for the purpose of the story. The only exception was Barny because he was so damn cute.

I was privileged to be there, and I remember that time as one of the highlights of my life. I still have my thick leather handler’s glove.

All raptors are protected by state and federal regulations. It is illegal to capture or kill a raptor; it is also illegal to possess a raptor (living or dead) without the proper permits from local state governments and the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. https://sciencetrek.org › topics › birds_of_prey › facts5

Thank you for stopping by and hanging around to read and give a clap or 50.