A little while back my mom found a young Swainsons Hawk on the side of the road. My son helped her nurse is while they pondered whether to send it to a centre or keep it. In our experience some of the centre's have not been entirely kind to the animals and, if they were, they were not entirely kind to the people that tried to help the animals. So, we were extremely hesitant to let him go.
He didn't appear to have any physical injuries but he couldn't stand up, he didn't make any noise, and he was so weak that he didn't care that we handled him. After a day of chicken wings and rest he was regaining strength and starting to call to the birds outside. We think he was just in a position where he didn't get enough food, maybe was almost hit by a car and stunned and was left without enough energy to continue. We seriously thought about keeping him, we could get him back to health and let him go, but there was a few issues like teaching him to hunt and keeping him from getting too close to humans after he was attached to us.
I did some googling to see if I could find a suitable place that we could feel comfortable taking him. My mom remembered a show on TV that had talked about a place in Southern Alberta that seemed to have a great reputation. With this information I found the Alberta Birds of Prey Foundation http://www.burrowingowl.com/. We had a few conversations and felt comfortable with them taking Griffin (we decided he needed a name).
After a little more than a month, living with an older Hawk and without human contact, Griffin is ready to go free! We made the journey down to the Writing on Stone Provincial Park where the release was set to take place... party because of it's distance away from civilization and partly because it should be close to their migratory path at this time of year... the birds can catch up with their buddies. What an amazing place, we definately intend to head back there next summer and spend some time in the hoodoos.
I was really impressed with Colin, the man who runs the centre. We introduced ourselves and, even though he had a few dozen students from a school there waiting for him, he took the time to get Griffin first and pose for a picture with my son before letting the bird go. It was awesome and he really tried to make it special, we are very grateful to him.
I would highly recommend this place to anyone who finds and injured bird, it's also a great place to go and learn about wild birds and their recovery. They have some who cannot be set free that children have the opportunity to get close to and learn about. All in all, a fantastic day!
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