Nearly every birder has heard of Hawk Mountain, located 75 miles northwest of Philadelphia. It was that one place where hunters went with their families to slaughter hawks on their southward journey. This slaughter was for no purpose other than sport because they thought hawks killed chickens and other small game animals. Hawks and other large birds of prey had a bad image with the public and when they were killed everybody cheered. Even our country’s symbol was slaughtered for fun.
It was a dim time for hawks crossing over Hawk Mountain in the early 1900s, that is until a socialite named Rosalie Edge stepped in and stopped the slaughter. Rosalie Edge is little known in the environmental world, but she was an important person in the American environmental movement. She raised enough money to purchase a 1,400 acre plot on Hawk Mountain and step up a guard in 1934 to turn the hunters away. Today, Hawk Mountain covers 2,600 acres, is owned and operated by a non-profit group. This group has more than 9,000 members and has a yearly budget of $1.8 million.
In the 75 years since its inception as a reserve, Hawk Mountain gets thousands of visitors each year. Instead of guns, these visitors come with cameras and binoculars. This fall it is estimated that 60,000 people will visit the mountain. The most popular spot is the North Lookout, which offers a 180 degree, 50 mile view of Kittatinny Ridge. Every kind of birder comes to Hawk Mountain – the experts, the counters, the listers, or the ones that just want to see the hawk’s incredible journey. Ever since 1934, people have been counting hawks on the mountain and this is important to assess populations.
I give great thanks to people like Rosalie Edge. Environmentalists like her give a second chance to wildlife and remove the oppression granted to them by humans.
Click here for the full article.
Picture: Credit to Faded Kodachrome on Fickr.
-
