Raptors Celebrate the Spring Festival at BRRC

After more than a week of fog and haze, the skies over Beijing finally cleared on 2 March 2007 and under a warm sun that held the promise of early spring, two raptors unfurled their wings and launched themselves into the air at the Jiufeng National Forest Park, flying off into the blue sky.

The raptors were both rescued by the IFAW Beijing Raptor Rescue Center (BRRC) over the Chinese New Year holiday, also called Spring Festival. After several weeks of loving care by center staff, they were the first of a group of raptors scheduled for release into the wild after Spring Festival.

This is not the first “New Year” for the raptors at the rescue center. So far in 2007, the BRRC has already rescued 35 sick or injured raptors, including two that were injured in freak accidents that arrived during the long Spring Festival break. The two who were released on 2 March were the lucky ones of these 35.

After they were found, they were sent immediately to the BRRC for treatment and care. One was a Collared Scops owl that was found on 9 February on a street by a kind passerby, Mr. Liu. When the bird arrived at the center, he was bleeding from his nose, eyes and beak, which seemed to indicate that that he had been hit by a car or had flown into a glass building.

The other was a Sparrow hawk that had been caught after it found its way into a pigeon coop. The owner of the coop, Mr. Deng, was rather surprised when he went to check on his pigeons only to find that there was an extra bird in the coop. Furthermore, his pigeons were highly agitated, flying madly about. After catching the bird, he immediately contacted the BRRC. Center staff identified it as a Sparrow hawk, which mainly captures small birds for food, and believe that he probably became trapped in the pigeon coop while trying to catch the small sparrows that were flying in and out.

After a period of treatment, the Collared Scops owl has almost fully recovered from his injuries but has lost the sight of the injured eye. However, after a series of tests, it was determined that the little owl’s flying and hunting abilities do not seem to have been impaired, so the staff decided to give him another chance to live in the wild. The sparrow hawk, who suffered no injury other than the shock of being captured and some minor scrapes on his wings and head, also completely recovered.

This year was the first year that the Beijing city government amended its restrictions on setting firecrackers and fireworks during the Spring Festival period, allowing the pyrotechnics during a specified period only. During this period, the greatest concern to the BRRC staff was not the injuries of birds in their care but rather the noise from the Spring Festival firecrackers and fireworks. In addition to the aforementioned two raptors, nine others were also at the Raptor Center to “celebrate" the New Year. How would they respond to the incessant racket of the firecrackers?

To reduce the stress on these birds, the center staff moved them all indoors. Nonetheless, the noise so frightened the birds that for the entire week none of them ate normally and some flew around their cages in such a panic that they crashed into the sides and broke their feathers. With the approach of Lantern Festival day, which marks the end of the Chinese New Year holiday period, the noise from the fireworks escalated again, which was another ordeal for the recovering birds at the Raptor Center.

The Collared Scops owl and the Sparrow hawk are both Class 2 nationally protected animals, with extremely small numbers remaining in the wild. In recent years, as these birds faced survival problems caused by pollution and food shortages, the BRRC has taken in more than a dozen sick or injured Collared Scops owls and Sparrow hawks each year. Most are discovered by kind-hearted Beijing residents who contact the BRRC.