What Do You Do When You Get To Work and THIS Is Staring At You?
Not too long ago we went to one of our regular clients, a large retailer in Santa Clarita, to do some regular maintenance work. We were also asked to install some bird spikes in the eves of the building to cut down on the large Pidgeon population around the store.
But do you know what loves eating Pidgeon? Large Falcons. Thus falcons, being birds who also eat birds, are doubly against bird spikes. And when we went up the ladders to install bird spikes there was a very disapproving falcon in its nest waiting for us.
What do we do? We didn’t want to disturb the nest. We certainly didn’t want to hurt the falcon or its eggs. We were also a little afraid of the falcon. They look mean up close. On top of all that, as seen in the photo below, the falcon had made a very stylish nest from a big pile of shiny tinsel.
We had to call in some help in the form of the Ojai Raptor Center. The Los Padres and Angeles National forests are a major stomping ground for large predatory birds, and we were lucky to have these conservation and rescue experts at hand.
Located in the hills about fifteen minutes north of Ventura, CA , their four-acre campus is comprised of a medical room and hospital, as well as outdoor flight pens, aviaries and mews. Every year they take in 1000-1500 sick, injured or orphaned birds with the hopes of rehabilitating them and releasing them back to the wild. Their busiest time of year is nesting season, when the center becomes inundated with orphaned birds that need help to grow, learn to fly, feed themselves and socialize before their release.
Beyond wildlife rehabilitation, their Wildlife Education Tours, Virtual Programs and Outreach Programs are supremely important to the work they do. Ojai Raptor Center is committed to teaching the public about our local raptor species, and how human interaction affects them. Through wildlife education they hope to inspire people to learn more about birds of prey and how to protect them. They achieve wildlife education by providing educational programs with their raptor ambassadors — the non-releasable birds of prey who live at the center, and are trained to be ambassadors for their species.
We were very happy to have the experts at the center come and relocate this falcon’s nest. It is not hard to imagine the comedy and damage that would likely have ensued if a couple general contractors tried to do the job on their own. Of course, we made a healthy donation to the Ojai Raptor Center to show our gratitude for their help. We’d like to encourage you to take a look at the centers website and consider supporting their mission yourself.