A Hope for Wings: Musings of a Raptor Hacker and Tales of Bird of Prey Recovery

What makes a bird of prey so intriguing? What is so enrapturing about them? So cool? Is it the long, arched and ebony colored hooks? These are not nails, not claws, but specifically named as their primal possession: talons are the key feature for grabbing and seizing by raptors. Their coarse sandpaper foot pads, their long legs that are usually folded and hidden as part of the body, their wings and tail built for specific types of air mastery, and their eyesight keen beyond our understanding – these mystify us all in their uniqueness of design and use. The very rarity of hawk, eagle, and owl sightings causes us to wonder all the more. But perched as they are at the top of the food chain, they are also at greater risk. This relational position makes them automatically an unintended target of our careless stewardship of the wild. A natural indicator dial of our mismanagement of earth, they are also a sensible target for restoration.A Hope for Wings relates stories of relationships to eagles, hawks, and owls from the perspective of a field biologist, falconer, and student of raptor behavior. The author spent most of his professional life releasing and monitoring bald eagles, peregrine falcons, barn owls, and osprey in the Ohio Valley states. This story of their recovery is personalized by his intimate relationships to these awe inspiring birds. Their individual natures as well as their biological and behavioral characteristics are revealed in stories of incidents that occurred during the years of hacking and follow-up investigation. The book is also a clarion call for bringing the conservation movement back to the importance of relationships. When our interactions are viewed in terms of us against them, people apart from nature, and progress vs. protection dichotomies, we find no way to heal that which is injured – no means of finding a wholeness. As harm is detected in the wild world, we seek fixes from science. But science alone leaves out the heart of people – one of the key ingredients for why we want to see things made right. In our fight against irreverence and disrespect for wildlife we often forget one of those heart weapons – hope. Conservation needs hope for wholeness. In these tales, may you find your own.