Recently I started thinking about an old job I had tracking Harris’ Hawks in Tucson. I worked jointly for the university and the power company, tracking down electrocuted birds and watching nests. It was a good experience for me, and even now when I am outside driving or walking, I scan the skies for Harris’ Hawks. Just a flash of their dark brown wings or the sight of one observing the world from a tall pine tree makes me feel happy. One hawk in particular crosses my mind often, and I find many people are fascinated with her story. We called her Stumpy, on account of her missing leg.
Stumpy was a healthy young female until the day she was found. She had landed on a telephone pole, caught her leg in a transformer and been electrocuted. The electricity literally blew one of her legs off as it traveled through her body, scorching feathers and burning the tips of her extremities. I wasn’t there when she was captured and tagged, but she was listed as near death and wasn’t expected to live after release.
Nine months later I was out trapping hawks for tagging when two hawks landed on the ground near the trap. They were triangulating the packrat inside the trap — Harris’ Hawks frequently hunt together and will work together to “trap” something themselves. We were curious as we watched what appeared to be a small male “give up” the kill to another bird. The other bird pounced and the trap did its magic — her talons got caught in slender fishline loops and she could not fly away. We ran over and discovered she only had one leg — the other was just a stump. Not only that, she was already tagged, and a quick check of the records showed us her history and the fact that this electrocuted, nearly dead animal had somehow managed to survive.
How did she do it? How could a one-legged animal who was severely injured manage to heal herself and hunt enough food to stay alive? The answer: family. Harris’ Hawks create family groups. These groups are not “blood relations;” they are groups of hawks that live and work together as a team. Frequently they are related but sometimes birds go to other territories and join other family groups. Nobody really knows why; maybe their families are killed, or maybe their mother drives them nuts. It’s hard to say.
Well, Stumpy had a family group, and her family group took care of her and helped her to live. I was touched and a little awed that this bird was still alive; not only that, she appeared to be sitting on eggs. I mentioned this to my boss, who discounted that idea. “She can’t be sitting on eggs. That’s the alpha female’s job, and an injured bird like this could never be an alpha.” Harris’ Hawks are matriarchal in nature, and the alpha female is the head of the clan. She fights the alpha male if he tries to usurp her position on the highest branch, and she will frequently discipline beta males and females as well.
I can’t say whether Stumpy really was an Alpha or whether her family gave her the job of sitting on the nest because she was a poor hunter, but sit on the nest she did. Even though I had no scientific reason to watch Stumpy, I used to drive by the nest if I was in the area and seek her out with the binoculars. It was easy to pick her out with her blasted off leg, and it got so that my presence would cause her to scream the alarm to the rest of the family. “That damn human is back,” I imagined her saying. “She thinks I don’t recognize her in that silver Toyota, but I wasn’t born yesterday, even if I’ve only got one leg.” She was a good nest watcher. She would cry a warning call if anyone got within a quarter mile of that nest, and sure enough, two or three birds would fly through the trees, looking for the trespasser.
One day I peeked at the nest through my binoculars and I saw them — the babies. There were two of them. A few weeks later, they were out of the nest and on a branch, screaming right along with Stumpy at the sight of me. And just a few weeks after that, they were gone, and I knew they had moved on to other territory because of the silence when I crossed the arroyo near their tree. Stumpy and her babies had moved on.
I don’t know what happened to Stumpy after her babies fledged, but I do know this — she was successful. The successful rearing of young in the wild is nature’s measure of success. It means that the species lives on. Harris’ Hawks only have a 20% chance of reaching adulthood, so in nature’s terms, Stumpy was extremely blessed. She was in no uncertain terms a winner.
I often see Harris’ Hawks in my neighborhood. I live close to the Zoo, the city’s largest urban park and a golf course, and there is always a nest somewhere in the neighborhood. This year they are nesting in a large pine two blocks down. I love to watch them surf the wind, the white bands on their tails flashing, whenever I walk to the park.
For some reason, whenever I see them, my depression seems to fall away. They’ve got it figured out, I think. They lean on each other. They extend their families far beyond blood ties. They take care of each other.
As a scientist, I am not supposed to attribute human traits to animals. We don’t say, “What are they feeling,” but instead say, “What are they doing.” Personally, I think that’s a big load of crap. Anyone who has had a pet knows an animal feels. And in my heart, I know that that family group felt something for Stumpy. They had no good reason to nurse a young, injured female back to health other than empathy. And somehow, knowing that those birds could do that gives me hope. It lifts my spirits, and I’m grateful I had the opportunity to know such magnificent birds.
Thanks to Arthur Morris at www.birdsasart.com
for the use of this magnificent photograph
