Sports

FEW WILDLIFE REHABILITATORS AID INJURED BIRDS

By Joe Mosby/ARKANSAS NEWS BUREAU
Saturday, June 7, 2008 10:29 PM CDT

If we break an arm, a hospital emergency room with trained staff is available to help. When a hawk breaks a wing, there isn’t any aid - unless the bird is found by a human and taken to a wildlife rehabilitator.

This screech owl, small in size but with a voice that provides its name, lost an eye and is used for educational programs. Arkansas News Bureau/Joe Mosby

These wildlife doctors have much of the training, licensing and technical skills as someone on a hospital staff, yet they work without pay, without financial backing and generally on their own. Their supplies come out of their pockets.

A couple of dozen rehabilitators are sprinkled around Arkansas, and one of them, Lynne Slater of London (Pope County) said quickly, “We need more rehabbers in Arkansas.”

Slater and Rodent Paul of El Paso (White County) are two wildlife rehabilitators who work extensively with raptors, bids of prey. This field includes hawks, owls, falcons, eagles and yes, vultures.

Working on their own and using cages and other facilities they built themselves, the raptor doctors help each other. They know who has expertise in one aspect of the treatment of sick and injured birds of prey. They all are under scrutiny in the form of state and federal regulations and permits. These are under the supervision of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The agencies hand down rules but not financial help.

Paul and Slater were recently involved in a raptor exchange. Paul has a flight cage, a large wire enclosure into which birds fly to exercise, regain strength and, hopefully, prepare for returning to the wild. Slater had sent a great horned owl to Paul for this flight cage treatment. The owl was ready to return to its normal life, and rehabbers usually attempt to release a recovered raptor in the same area from which it came.

Slater had a Harlan’s hawk, a subspecies of red-tailed hawk, that needed flight cage work, and a volunteer transported the birds in the exchange.

Slater said, “This great horned owl came from Yell County, and we’ll turn it loose right away.”

The treatment of hurt birds of prey is not always this successful for Paul, for Slater and for the handful of other rehabilitators around Arkansas who work with such birds.

If a raptor can’t be restored to near-normal life in the wild, it may gain a new vocation as an education exhibit. Paul and other rehabilitators frequently give programs to school groups, civic clubs and other organizations, using the life raptors as part of their talks. Children especially pay close attention when a sharp-eyed live hawk is perched a few feet away from them.

Eagles are special, both to the public and to the rehabilitators. A growing number of bald eagles and a few golden eagles winter in Arkansas each year, and some bald eagles are year-round residents. Accidents and shootings result in several eagles going to rehabilitation each year. When one recovers and can be returned to the wild, it’s a cause for celebration and even a media opportunity.

Eagles and the other raptors, even small ones like screech owls and kestrels, can be hazardous to deal with.

Paul himself wound up going for emergency treatment after an eagle accident. He had the big bird on his protected arm while photos were taken. He turned to the photographer, drew in his arm just enough for the eagle to reach his mouth - and the eagle promptly took a piece of Paul’s lip with it.

“I had to have three stitches in my upper lip,” Paul said.

A list of Arkansas wildlife rehabilitators and their specialties is maintained the Game and Fish Commission’s Web site.