Beijing center works to rehabilitate raptors

Last month, the Beijing Raptor Rescue Center received 91 baby raptors.

After conducting physical examinations and providing needed treatments and rehabilitation, center staff members are gradually choosing suitable places such as city parks and suburban areas to release the healthy young birds.

Beijing is home to dozens of kinds of raptors, which are predatory birds that play an important role in pest control and maintaining environmental health and ecological balance.

Experts at the Beijing Raptor Rescue Center said that most raptors can be divided into three orders: accipitriformes, which includes eagles and hawks; strigiformes, of which owls belong to; and falconiformes, which consists of falcons and caracaras.

While some raptors such as eagles are quite large, others are considerably smaller, including oriental scops owls and common kestrels, which are so common in cities that they even nest outside air conditioners.

May and June are the months during which many raptors are born, and soon afterward, they must learn to fly. It is around this time that the center receives many calls for help, said Zhou Lei, a rehabilitation therapist at the center. "Concerned citizens take the baby birds they find to the police station or neighborhood committee, and if they are confirmed to be raptors, we will go and pick them up," she said.

In recent years, due to habitat destruction, wildlife trade and other human factors, injuries and malnutrition are currently the main threats to raptors.