Eagle incident threatens funding for wildlife rehabilitation group

Larry Pynn
Vancouver Sun

February 14, 2004
Future public donations to the Orphaned Wildlife Rehabilitation Society in South Delta are at risk after the B.C. government pressured the non-profit facility into handing over a juvenile bald eagle in its care to a commercial falconer.

Bev Day, who founded OWL in 1985 to rehabilitate injured birds of prey, said donors to the non-profit society -- one of them a woman who has named the society in her will -- are demanding to know why their donations are being used to provide birds for falconers instead of for return to the wild.

Day said she informs concerned callers that she doesn't like giving any birds away, but notes that the provincial ministry of water, land and air protection, which issues her facility an operating permit, has given her no choice in the matter.

"Why does the government have that right to force us to give these birds over?" she said.

"I'm not saying there shouldn't be laws on how we do our care, cage sizes, that sort of stuff. But for them to just come down and tell us what we have to do with the birds, that's crazy. "

Day said she received a phone call last summer from John Van Hove of the ministry's Surrey office, pressuring her to give a bald eagle she had been looking after for three months to Dennis Maynes, a commercial falconer from Surrey.

"I was forced to do it," she said. "They could shut us down. I was told it would be nice if I cooperated. I said to him straight out, 'You're forcing me to give it to this fellow?' And he said, 'No, I'm saying cooperation would go a long way.' "

Bill Barisoff, the newly appointed minister of water, land and air protection, said he appreciates Day's concerns, but said Maynes needed a bald eagle to chase birds such as Canada geese from areas where they pose a nuisance or threat, including airports. "There is a net benefit to society as a whole," Barisoff said. "Bald eagles are not a threatened species."

Because Maynes had a permit to capture two eagles from the wild for commercial use, it made sense to take one already in a rehabilitation centre rather than capture a wild one. "This was a much better solution. When there is one in captivity why would you go capture one?"

He added: "Mr. Maynes is under the strictest conditions and we can withdraw that permit at any time."

While Barisoff considers the situation a "unique circumstance," he could not rule out it happening again. The ministry is reviewing its falconry policy based on a consultant's review recommending, in part, the capture of bald eagles from the wild.

Day said she is not opposed to falconry, a sport in which birds are trained to hunt prey such as rabbits or ducks. In fact, she's used a handful of trusted falconers to take birds to see if they are capable to hunt on their own.

But these falconers only have the birds for a short time, with the condition they eventually be released. Maynes is different because he has no plans to release his bald eagle, a juvenile taken to OWL last summer after it was found on the ground near Southwest Marine Drive in Vancouver.

Rather than a isolated incident, Day said the ministry wants to use rehabilitation centres in future as the first choice for falconers who would otherwise take wild birds -- with no provision for financial compensation for feed, medicine and staff time.

Maynes, an official with the 40-member B.C. Falconry Association, confirmed there is a "personality conflict" with Day that required ministry officials to "flex their muscles a little bit to get this particular bird."

The bald eagle is being used to chase Canada geese at BCRail's property on the North Shore. "It's a low impact way to keep the geese off the property."

Maynes suggested the eagle was better off with him than being raised by OWL and released to the wild and an uncertain future.

Day said there is no reason to think the eagle could not have been successfully released.

OWL has an annual operating budget of $250,000, 75 per cent of it from donations. Last year the facility received 365 birds and releasing 75 per cent of them back to the wild.
© The Vancouver Sun 2004