Winter scene photo by Becky Hart
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Jane Fink-Cantwell Uses Education to Protect Idaho’s Birds of Prey
Photo by Dustin Weed, Quicksilver Studios
By Cate Huisman “That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been.” - Charles Dickens, Great Expectations For Jane Fink Cantwell of Saint Maries the epiphany came on a summer day almost 20 years ago, in her first week as a volunteer on a peregrine falcon project. “One of the conservation officers handed me a falcon during a media event,” she recalls. “I held this bird awkwardly, and the bird spun its head around and looked up at me. I’ll remember that moment until my last breath.” In that instant, Jane realized that humans could eradicate such a bird and its kin from the face of the earth, or they could restore the wild population of peregrines to its full glory. “That’s a pretty powerful position to be in,” she remembers thinking. And so formed the first link in the chain that has bound her since that day to birds of prey. Born in Germany and raised in the American Midwest, Jane grew up in an area devoid of eagles, ospreys, and peregrines. “I didn’t even know what a peregrine was,” she admits. After getting a degree in nursing, she was continuing with pre-med courses and planning on medical school when she decided she needed some time away from organic chemistry and physics. She has yet to make it to medical school. After the interaction with the particular peregrine that summer day, she switched academic directions and went to Purdue University where she wrote her master’s thesis on wintering bald eagle habitats. For the next ten years, off and on, Jane worked and studied at The Raptor Center at the University of Minnesota’s College of Veterinary Medicine, where she learned to treat injured raptors for release into the wild. (Continued on page 46)
Have You Found An Injured Raptor?
Individuals who come across an injured raptor should follow three steps to keep it safe and start it on the way to recovery: 1. Put a shirt or jacket over its head to calm it. 2. Wearing heavy gloves, grasp the bird by its legs (watch out for the sharp talons), and place it in a box or the trunk of a car immediately. 3. Call Idaho Department of Fish and Game (208-769-1414) or Birds of Prey Northwest (208-245-1367) to find out where you can take it for treatment.