Juneau Raptor Center

Remembering AJ..a Northern Harrier
By Irene Morris

JRC is sad to report the passing of AJ in October 2009.

I first met AJ when the Juneau Raptor Center had our exhibit mews at the Gold Creek Salmon Bake. He had come to us in November of 1994 with severe burns on his legs, probably from contact with an electrical wire. He was found injured near the AJ Mine, hence his name. His injuries healed with the care of JRC volunteers, but he lost his front talons on both of his feet and was considered non-releasable.

He eventually was housed at the Salmon Bake where we presented our exhibit birds in hopes of educating and raising funds for JRC. When we moved from the Salmon Bake site, AJ was housed at a volunteer’s home.

When my husband Bill and I bought a house out the road, we found ourselves with a building that could be used as an enclosure (also called a mew) to keep one of our education birds. AJ seemed to be the perfect bird since he was not yet trained. So we brought AJ out the road and Bill and I worked with him all that winter. We found that he was very responsive to contact with humans and very comfortable with crowds. By Spring 1995 AJ was ready to present programs at schools and community events….he was a teacher.

AJ required different accessories than most raptors that we use for education. He couldn’t grab onto leather gloves without his front talons, so I used knit gloves with padding inside that he could grab on with his back talon. His legs were fragile with scar tissue, so I made fleece jesses (ankle “bracelets”) with snaps instead of the usual leather ones, and they had to be put on each time he had a program. This was a fun task as I made different colored jesses for him in the different seasons.

AJ was a Northern Harrier, a type of hawk that hunts like an owl by using the circular areas around his eyes to concentrate sounds of prey towards their offseting ear openings. I found it interesting that young children often thought that he was an owl, noticing the resemblance. We traveled to the Wrangell Garnet Festival and to five Haines Bald Eagle Festivals. He wasn’t the largest or flashiest of education birds at these events, but it seemed that everyone was interested in learning about him. His incredible sense of hearing made him a bit jumpy, but he put up with hours of public attendance. Whenever he was tired of it all, he would grab my arm and his back talons would pierce my arm to let me know it was time to go.

AJ enjoyed the luxury that all of JRC’s education birds do. He had special flat perches to accommodate his lack of talons. Since Harriers are low-oriented birds and roost close to the ground, he had logs and rocks as well as the perches.

In the winter months, he had 14 hours of supplemented lighting and a heated water bowl to compensate for migrating south. In his later years, we brought him inside if the temperatures dropped below 20 degrees and doubled his feed to keep his body temperature normal. In the summer, I tethered him out while I worked in the garden.

I feel very fortunate to have had AJ in my life. He helped me to create interest and responsibility for our birds and our environment in so many children and adults. We had regular weekly programs at the Mendenhall Glacier Visitors Center during the summers of 2005 and 2006, where he met hundreds of visitors to Alaska from all over the world. His last program at Glacier Valley school was just a day before he died (October 2009), and the children were fascinated by this little raptor. AJ was a remarkable example of the impact that our education birds can have on the public, he will never be forgotten and we will all miss him.

Kira: Peregrine falcon in passing (Juneau Empire)