A St. Patrick’s Day tale of snakes and hawks

VIC LEIPZIG AND LOU MURRAY

We hope you’re wearing green today, not just to show your support for

the environment, but because it’s St. Patrick’s Day. It’s time for

shamrocks, corned beef and cabbage, and snakes. Oops, no snakes. St.

Patrick drove them out of Ireland in the sixth century.

Actually, he didn’t. There were never any snakes in Ireland.

Banishing the snakes is said to represent the destruction of the

pagan beliefs that existed in Ireland during the life of St. Patrick.

The snakes in the legend were symbols of the nature-based religion

that St. Patrick was trying to eliminate.

Today, we don’t drive out snakes; we rescue them. Last week, Vic

and I were at a meeting with Jack Fancher at the Bolsa Chica

Interpretive Center. Grace Adams, the executive director of the Bolsa

Chica Conservancy, called me out of the meeting to identify a young

snake that had slithered onto the wheelchair ramp. Maybe the snake

wanted to hear the latest developments in the Bolsa Chica restoration

project.

Grace wondered if it was a rattlesnake. But the little guy had no

rattle at the end of its tail. It was a harmless gopher snake, but it

was in harm’s way. It needed to be removed from the walkway and put

into a more suitable habitat.

At my request, one of the Conservancy’s volunteers brought me a

black bucket and a glove. The snake saw the dark interior of the

bucket as a safe place to retreat from the waving glove. It quickly

crawled inside, which is just what I wanted. I tipped the bucket up

and handed it to the volunteer, who released the snake behind the

Interpretive Building under a large boxthorn bush. There it would be

safe from predators such as hawks.

Which brings us to the next part of our St. Patrick’s Day tale.

Red-tailed hawks prey upon, among other things, the snakes that live

at the Bolsa Chica. One pair of red-tailed hawks has set up

housekeeping in a venerable eucalyptus just northwest of the

Meadowlark Shopping Center on Warner. According to local residents, a

pair of hawks has nested in that tree for eight or nine years.

Planning Commissioner Steve Ray asked us to look at the nest to

see if it was active, because a developer is planning to cut down the

tree to build condos. We took our birding scope and binoculars and

headed north past the strawberry stand to look at the tree. We found

two nests. One was older and unused.

A female red-tailed hawk was sitting in the other nest,

undoubtedly incubating eggs. If she is a typical hawk, she will have

laid two or three eggs, although clutches of up to five eggs are

possible. She’ll incubate the eggs for 28 to 32 days. Then she and

her mate will have a full-time job bringing back mice, rats, snakes

and any other small prey they can find to feed the hungry nestlings.

After about 40 to 45 days, the youngsters will begin to try their

wings. At first, they just flop around, half-flying, half-falling.

Sooner or later, they catch on to the concept of flying, and

eventually they learn to hunt for their own food. They will stay with

the parents for most of the summer, learning their job of finding and

catching small rodents, birds and reptiles.

The question we want to ask is, what will happen to that tree?

Unfortunately, city staff fell down on the job and informed the

planning commission that hawks were not protected, and the planning

commission voted to approve the project on a 4-3 vote. A comment from

one commissioner, incredibly, was that birds can fly and they can

just go somewhere else. This shows an amazing lack of knowledge of

animal behavior, carrying capacity of the environment and

environmental law.

First of all, birds and other animals can’t just go somewhere

else. Existing habitats are generally full. As a rule, if a hawk can

survive in any given location, a hawk already lives there. If two

hawks can survive there, two hawks already live there. When we force

animals to relocate, we almost always overload the local ecosystem,

and either the newcomer or one of the previous residents will die.

And suggesting that these nesting birds go elsewhere at this time

ignores one important fact. Eggs don’t fly.

Fortunately, there are laws in place to protect nesting birds. The

Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 prohibits harming feathers, nests

or eggs of any bird protected by that treaty. Red-tailed hawks are

found on the lengthy list of migratory birds that are protected. To

disturb them while they are nesting is illegal. We’re sure a

California Department of Fish and Game warden would be happy to set

the city straight on this issue if there are any questions.

Furthermore, other statutes protect mature, scenic trees. If

someone wanted to fight to keep the tree from being cut down after

the young hawks have fledged, there might be a basis for such a

fight.

There are laws in place to protect the environment, which includes

habitats and the birds and animals that live in them. All it takes is

an informed and willing public to insist on enforcement of those

laws. On this St. Patrick’s Day, don’t just wear green to be Irish

for a day. Show your true environmental colors and be green.

* VIC LEIPZIG and LOU MURRAY are Huntington Beach residents and

environmentalists. They can be reached at [email protected].