May 26, 2005

Jerry Papania, left, and Dan Halm building part of a new flight cage for birds of prey at the Glen Helen Raptor Center. The two-year project is expected to be completed in June. Those interested in helping with the project may contact the center at 767-7648.

By Lauren Heaton

Most birds aren’t meant to live in cages. But if, in order to heal, they must be temporarily put behind bars, they could at least have enough room to spread their wings.

It’s no small task to build a cage fit for birds to fly around in, let alone one that’s big enough for the one- to two-meter wingspans of a peregrine falcon or a turkey vulture. But the Glen Helen Raptor Center cuts no corners for its raptors and soon will have a cage in which even the most rowdy of raptors might be happy to lounge, eating freshly thawed mice at their leisure.

Hidden amongst the trees like a secret fort, the center’s new flight cage is not visible from the Raptor Center. Visitors are kept away from most of the birds in rehab to preserve their natural habitat as much as possible, said Betty Ross, the director of the Raptor Center. A bank of cages for the smaller kestrels and screech owls lines the path behind the center’s resident vultures and Solo, the bald eagle. And behind those cages is a raptor cage fit for kings, or at least giant kingfishers.

Measuring 100 feet in length along one wall and 50 feet along the other, the L-shaped cage stands 16 feet tall and allows large birds to practice their banking and air-skidding skills as they learn to turn corners again. The all-wooden cage has barn-like hanging doors that slide shut to divide it in two parts, each with its own big bird perches and sheltered plywood corners.

Each year the Raptor Center accepts an average of 200 injured birds found hit by cars, tripped on telephone wires or edged out of their nests as babies, Ross said. Some must be euthanized, but many are bandaged, fed and kept in the flight cages until they have recuperated enough to return to the natural world.

The Glen has had several 30-foot by 12-foot cages that the larger birds have tolerated for many years. But when Ross entreated four area friends of the Glen to donate funds to the Raptor Center five years ago, a vulture-appropriate cage became a possibility.

Glen Helen Association member Jerry Papania, an engineer who designed several of the center’s other cages in the 1970s, set to work designing the big cage to Ross’s specifications. But the plan required such large posts and rafters that the usual bevy of Glen volunteers wasn’t enough to raise the structure.

It took help from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and the Ohio Division of Wildlife, which came in with cranes and heavy-lifting equipment, to get the project back on track. A crew of 12 workers from Greene County’s District 5 office, plus helpers from the Spring Valley, Indian Creek and Fallsville wildlife areas, volunteered a total of two weeks during 2003 and 2004 to build the framework of the cage. Then last month, when the weather cleared, a crew of GHA board members and stewardship committee members, including Papania, Jim Mayer, Dan Halm, Tony Arnett and Scott Geisel, started working on the cage.

The group spent the last six weekends finishing the framing and nailing long wood slats across the roof of the cage. They estimate that it will take another three weeks to finish the siding, and they invite anyone who is interested in helping to contact the Raptor Center to schedule work days.

“We decided we’d rather do this than go to meetings,” Papania said. “This is a good project to get the community involved with the Glen.”

Ross estimates that the cost of materials alone is close to $10,000, and said without the hundreds of hours of donated labor from community and area residents, the cage would not have been possible.

Dan Frevert, management supervisor for the wildlife division, said this is the only cage of its size in the 17-county district. Ross has been involved with training and rehabilitating birds across Ohio and has been a big help to the wildlife division, Frevert said.

“They have helped us a lot, and we try to help them whenever we can,” he said.

Ross said she does not anticipate that the number of birds the Glen handles will increase but that those ospreys, great horned owls, red-tailed hawks and the occasional eagle that come to the Raptor Center will finally get a proper flight facility.

“We’ll finally be finished with it this year, and I’m really excited,” Ross said. “It’s strong enough to withstand tornadoes, hurricanes…I guarantee it’s never going to fall down.”