Island Falconry Services

Sunday morning, Here we go

Hello everyone,Peter here from Island Falconry I’m going to apologize for the long post but it’s been eating away at me all day and I feel I should say something. Yesterday evening I was contacted about a hawk that was injured and couldn’t fly. It was too late to go out last night, so early this morning I went to see if I could help catch the hawk.
We successfully caught the Hawk and I promptly took it to AVC. Fiep and the students were again five star professionals and extra quick to come get the hawk from me. Not long after I received an email. The Hawk had been Shot!! Yes Shot, with a shot gun. It is deeply saddening to me that someone would shoot a raptor, any raptor. Hawk, Falcon, Kestrel, Eagle. There is never any good reason to shoot a raptor. This looks like bird shot! Possibly a duck or goose hunter. Or possibly someone who has chickens. Or maybe just someone who thought it would be fun to shoot a bird.
Regardless it’s terribly frustrating to see a bird in distress, and one that was in that situation because of a human. Our raptors have a 70% mortality rate in the wild. They certainly don’t need people to be shooting at them. Please, if you have a raptor causing trouble, reach out to Fish and Wildlife, reach out to me at Island Falconry. We will help, there’s always a better solution. In this case a beautiful young ( 2021 )
Hatched Northern Male Goshawk had to be Euthanized. All because someone shot him intentionally. This was no accident. Because hunters are supposed to identify what they are shooting at, and farmers know they shouldn’t shoot Raptors. We all know in 2021 that these birds are struggling to survive. If anyone has any information that could help with the investigation in to this shooting please reach out. The bird was found in the Hope River area.