Ill Student iBook Special
INCLUDED
Wee Bee computer bag
($95 value}
Apple iBook Combo
1.2GHz PowerPC G4
256MB DDR266 SDRAM
.30C-if3 U.l'trf» A!A /drive
MSB 23 U /A
$899
Digital Duck Bundle Price
1 iiir*fJl« indii'i< '• W'< I <’ < < .<t»t nil* i I mc) -*«i?.i
1 (I'.ori C.;06 |» It it'I
I iiqh< r I tin' -itidfi 1 ’! !■ ■ 'iifirioD
St<irif).ii(.l R'tul I’u< < <il Jr1
FREE
Epson C86 printer
/(after mail m rebate)
All offers sublet to change and availability. UOBookstore.com
021098
It’s easy...
Just go to the UO Health Center
at 13th and Agate.
But don’t miss the deadline.
Sign-up runs now through January 21.
Review details of the plan on our web page:
http://healthcenter.uoregon.edu
Any questions? Call 346-2832
UNIVERSITY OF OREGON
University Health Center
We've got sp
at www Hflilvpmpralrl mm
Erik R. Bishoff | Photographer
Cascades Raptor Center volunteer and University graduate Erica Broderick holds
Usiku, a southwestern barred owl. Usiku was discovered with a fractured wing by a
creek in the Houston, Texas, area and was transferred to CRC in October 2003.
CRC is home to 55 permanent residents.
Local center cares
for birds affected
by human contact
Cascades Raptor Center is a nonprofit hospital that
has been caring for handicapped birds since 1987
BY KYLE DICKMAN
DAILY EMERALD FREELANCE REPORTER
The smell of 65 dead quails would
offend almost anyone, but for Laurin
Coggins of the Cascades Raptor Center,
a nonprofit nature center and wildlife
hospital, it is hardly an inconvenience:
It’s just the next meal on the menu.
She nonchalantly slits the bellies of the
female quails, reaches in with bare
hands, and removes their eggs.
“The eggs are too high in choles
terol, plus some of the birds flat out re
fuse to eat them,” she said.
She then lays the limp birds into
trays and delicately garnishes them
with an algae-based vitamin mixture
for the afternoon volunteers to deliver
to the raptors. It is done with the care
and efficiency of a five-star restaurant,
but Coggins admits she would rather
prepare rat.
Coggins studied art at Savannah
College of Art and Design, The School
of the Art Institute of Chicago and the
Oregon College of Arts and Crafts in
Portland. Before she earned one of two
full-time positions at the raptor center,
she supported herself through he, tex
tile art. When she started feeling too
self-involved, she volunteered.
“I just needed to do something for
somebody else,” she said.
Or something else, as it turned out.
“I fell madly in love with him,” she
said. Coggins is referring to Leathe, a
male turkey vulture. These birds
choose their mates and usually stay to
gether for life.
Leathe is one of 55 permanent
bird residents adopted by the center.
Most of the birds are handicapped,
both physically and mentally, by
interactions with humans and will
never be able to return to the wild.
Leathe is an imprinted bird, or a
bird that prefers the company of hu
mans to his own species.
Coggins comments on individual
birds’ preferences: Edgar the crow likes
grapes, particularly organic red seed
less ones; Aeolus, a bald eagle, would
never be found indulging himself in
such extravagances, despite his appar
ent Greek affiliation. As Coggins ap
proaches Zachariah-the-Raven’s cage
with an egg, he rolls his eyes and cack
les, uninterested in Coggins but in
trigued by the egg.
The bird’s unique personalities at
tract volunteers and binding. Visitors
often financially “adopt” birds. Due to
regulations, adopters lacking proper
certification cannot handle the raptors.
Coggins’ mother, who recently adopt
ed Leathe, still loves to watch the bird
interact with her daughter.
On Tuesday, Leathe moved in with
Kali, the center’s larger, more aggres
sive female turkey vulture. Coggins
hopes separating the birds with mesh
wire will allow the birds to grow accus
tomed to each other.
“We really need them to learn to
deal with each other,” she said.
It is an issue of space. The center
cannot afford to have two birds of the
same species living in separate cages.
“We always have new birds coming
in,” she said.
The center has grown steadily
since its establishment in 1987. Ini
tially, the organization was housed in
a two-bedroom duplex with a small
back yard filled with cages. It moved
RAPTORS, page 8