Nature Done Wright

Stiles Thomas reports that the Red-shouldered Hawks are bringing hemlock sprigs to their nest on Gray Avenue  — a great sign that they'll be nesting soon.

Just as an fyi:  "Survival: The Red-shouldered Hawks of Allendale,"  the photo-driven book that so many of us contributed to, is available as an iBook for iPad and iPhone…  The book features the history of these hawks in Allendale, and many terrific photos.

The
download sells for $2.99, with half the proceeds going to The Raptor
Trust, an amazing hawk rehabilitation center that saved the life of a
Red-shouldered Hawk named Laura — the main protagonist of the book.

Link to the download site, including a 15-page preview, is here.  You can buy also soft-cover or hard-cover from this site  — beautiful but expensive — or, better
yet,  contact me.  Maybe we can buy a bunch together and save money.
All proceeds go to The Raptor Trust…

The iPad version
will (I hope) put "Survival" in the hands of far more bird-lovers for
less than cost of postage for the book. 

You can also download the book on iTunes here.

Full details follow.

Support
The Raptor Trust and learn more about a dynamic and endangered hawk
species by downloading the beautiful new eBook “Survival: The
Red-shouldered Hawks of Allendale, N.J.”

 The
eBook, for iPads and iPhones, is a 70-page, full-color book about a
family of hawks who have battled long odds to nest in a northern New
Jersey suburb for more than a decade.  The download costs $2.99, with
half the proceeds going to benefit The Raptor Trust.

“Survival,” written by Jim Wright, features a foreword by Raptor Trust Executive Director Len Soucy.

The book showcases exceptional photography by Jerry Barrack and many other friends of the Celery Farm Natural Area in Allendale.

The
Raptor Trust, one of the preeminent avian rehabilitation centers in the
United States, saved the life of a Red-shouldered hawk named Laura, who
had been found dazed on an Allendale lawn four years ago — at the time
just the latest in a series of tragedies befalling the species in
Allendale.

“Survival” is the story of those travails — and the inspiring, photo-filled story of Laura and her offspring.

This
species, named for the reddish feathers on the front of its shoulders,
was described more than a century ago as the most common hawk in
America. Since then, in a long slow spiral, the hawk has fallen on hard
times in many states, including New Jersey.

New
Jersey’s Endangered and Non-game Species Program has designated the
Red-shoulder an endangered species when nesting and a threatened species
other times of year. Both designations indicate the species is in
trouble. At last count, there were some 40 nesting pairs statewide.

The
book also includes a chapter on the Red-shoulders’ courtship flight, a
first-person account of what it’s like to host a Red-shoulder nest, and a
reprinted chapter on Red-shoulders from the classic 1898 book “Birds
that Hunt and Birds that Are Hunted.”