The world is a mask that hides the real world.
Thatâs what everybody suspects, though the world we see wonât let us dwell on it long.
The world has ways - more masks - of getting our attention.
The suspicion sneaks in now and again, between the cracks of everyday existenceâ¦the bird song dips, rises, dips, trails off into blue sky silence before the note that would reveal the shape of a melody that, somehow, would tie everything together, on the verge of unmasking the hidden armature that frames this sky, this tree, this bird, this quivering green leaf, jewels in a crown.â¦
As the song dies, the secret withdraws.
The tree is a mask.
The sky is a mask.
The quivering green leaf is a mask.
The song is a mask.
The singing bird is a mask.
Friday, April 29, 2005
falconer devastated by falcon theft, death
UPDATE: Grommet was found dead later during the day that the story (below) was published. Magnificent bird. R.I.P.
Grommet [Sacramento Bee]
Purloined falcon is owner's passion
By Christina Jewett
Sacramento Bee, 29 April 2005
Douglas Bell knew his peregrine falcon might soar over ranchers' fields in Yolo County and never return. Still, he released the bird, Grommet, to hunt last summer, only to discover Wednesday that the falcon had fallen prey to a thief in Bell's east Sacramento backyard.
Bell, a professor of biology at California State University, Sacramento, is now consumed by his search for the 6-year-old raptor, and concern for his welfare.
Aside from a hand-fed diet of pigeon and quail, falcons need special care, Bell said.
"Otherwise, you could traumatize them mentally," he said.
Sacramento Police spokeswoman Michelle Lazark said Thursday that a burglary detective will be assigned to the case. Bell describes the purloined bird as stocky and crow-sized, blue-black with a cream-rust torso, with a squeak like a rusty door hinge.
Bell said he went through a detailed process five years ago to obtain a permit for the endangered bird, which was raised by falcons in the Bay Area.
"It takes such a commitment," Bell said. "I feed him on my fist on the glove every day. I spend time with him to make him happy."
Bell has shown Grommet, a well-mannered bird, to his conservation and ornithology classes at CSUS, he said.
"(Students) love to see a live creature," he said.
Bell said he's studied the peregrine falcon since 1970, when birds populated only five of 100 California cliffs known as nesting sights. Now, the birds have bounced back, with about 350 adults in the state, he said.
"(Grommet) is a guide for me that tells me what wild birds are, in a sense, thinking," he said. "By living with a falcon, you develop a more intimate rapport with what wild birds are doing."
On hunting trips, Bell said, he takes Grommet to open fields where the bird flies out of sight, and returns to stalk the starlings and pigeons that Bell rouses from the fields.
"As a falconer, one accepts the fact that you have a probability of losing (the bird), or having some other raptor kill it. What's unacceptable is when a human comes along and takes him," Bell said.
Bell arrived home at 64th Street near Elvas Avenue to find Grommet's mews (the proper name for a falcon shed) broken into on Wednesday. He said the padlock had apparently been pried open with a crowbar.
"I was ... quite upset, largely because this is probably the worst thing to happen, to have the bird stolen by someone who doesn't know how to care for it," he said.
Bell said cooked meat or beef could be hazardous to Grommet's health, and his talons could be hazardous to his captor.
"If he's grabbed, he will try to defend himself," Bell said.
Bell posted fliers in his neighborhood on Thursday and said he's offering a $1,000 reward for anyone who provides information that leads to Grommet's safe return. He encourages anyone who has the bird to surrender him to city police, CSUS police or the CSUS biology department.
The Sacramento Police Department can be reached at (916) 433-0650. Bell can be reached at the CSUS biology department at (916) 278-6535 or dbell @csus.edu.
