Raptors

[LovelyLadyLux]

Last week I took the crew to see "The Raptors" which is a birds of prey training, raising, rescue/help for injured bird center way out in the country about an hour south of here. They started out rescuing injured birds of prey but grew over the years to hand raising working birds of prey they actually are contracted to use for example at our International Airport which is built on a marshy estuary area that just calls to water birds.

Went there with the twins a few years ago when they were small but wanted to re-visit the place as I find it super interesting and now that the boys have their cameras they can spend hours taking photos of everything.

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The big bald eagles are always the hit of the show but I love to see all the different owls myself.

[Horus]

That's great for the kids, the sooner they learn about nature the better. I think I made a post sometime back about the Red Kite conservation project I visited in Wales where the feed them daily. Hundreds of these raptors appear from nowhere as soon as the food is thrown out, I had intended to visit again on my last trip but never got around to it.

[Grandad]

Love the barn owl......silent flyers

[LovelyLadyLux]

Here we almost have an over abundance of Bald Eagles. They were brought back from the brink and just kept multiplying. The Fellow cited one study where 3000 were counted hovering over a local landfill ostensibly waiting for the mice and rats to come out.

I couldn't hear the spiel very well as there were lots of kids talking during the show but the Fellow was talking about how countries like India have almost decimated their populations of vultures. It has to do with their own cultural practices of them trying to decompose dead things faster and this has served to kill off their vulture population which is making their problem of getting rid of dead things worse. I was trying to listen to what he had to say but just couldn't hear.

Apparently here we don't have this problem and our vultures are alive and well and doing their job of eating carcasses. He also gave lots of fun facts about vultures i.e. their stomach acid is probably the strongest in the world, they poop down their own legs and their poop serves to clean the bacteria off their legs .... lots of interesting tidbits like that. I should ask the twins as I'm sure they memorized every word.

This guy was really impressive. A Kestrel. They had him flying up and down the rows of people in the audience. He was swooping close and his tethers got dragged over the one Grandson's head which brought a big smile that the bird touched him.

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He was definitely a fast flier. Also known here as a sparrow hawk.

[Grandad]

Although quite similar, the kestrel and sparrow hawk are different species here LLL. I think you really have to know the different but similar markings to tell the difference.

LLL, perhaps you should remind the boys that there was a time long ago when occasionally they pooped down their legs

[LovelyLadyLux]

Interesting H as here Kestrel & Sparrow Hawk are used interchangeably and far as I know they are 1 species. Not sure if we actually have 2 different types.

This guy definitely was fast and I highly doubt a sparrow would have a chance against him.

Another tidbit of trivia was that a plain old pigeon is one of the fastest birds going. Not the fastest but one of. Wouldn't have thought it.

[Horus]

Yes I can imagine the fact that Vultures pooped down their own legs would have really interested the twins, little boys love those sort of facts (and big boys too)

[Horus]

I also remember seeing that programme about India's vultures dying off. Apparently it was the use of an animal antibiotic called 'Diclofenac' that gave them acute kidney failure if they ate the carcass.

[LovelyLadyLux]

@Horus - YES Bingo that is/was it. It is the antibiotic they're putting into the animals and then when the vultures eat it they're dying. From what this fellow said (wish I could have got closer but he kept walking up and down and once the 'show' started nobody was allowed to stand up or even raise their hands up in case one of the Raptors decided you were a tree branch they could sit on.

We have no shortage of vultures here. They're always hovering and there is a whole bunch of interesting tidbits of info about them - how far away they can smell a smell, their noses are see through, they can position themselves to absorb heat from the sun to warm their bodies etc. etc. etc. Other than them being kinda ugly looking they also rather fascinating.

The twins will split themselves when we talk again about Raptors and I give them the - 'wasn't too long ago you guys were pooping down your legs line.' Not too sure the Granddaughter would find that as funny - she has a different sense of humour than the boys.

[Kiya]

Lovely looking creatures but I don't fancy them flying past me so close

[LovelyLadyLux]

@Kiya Yeah I wasn't too thrilled to have them flapping past me but all the kids loved it. Granted they didn't have the really BIG birds flying up and down the audience just the little guys.