Berkshire Bird Paradise, Grafton, NY
Bird Paradise is one of the country’s biggest bird sanctuaries. (It’s also one of the hardest to find, off Route 2 in NY, near the Massachusetts/Vermont border.) More than 2,000 birds (100 species) live here and lots of them are the big ones everyone wants to see: bald and golden eagles; many kinds of large hawks; exotic pheasants; former pet songbirds; barnyard refugees; black swans. You’ll walk through a long green house-esque tunnel of former pets, then out to the yard. Ducks, geese and swans swim in a pond while pheasants and chickens wander around. Twelve bald eagles hang out together in the back. At the right time of year, visitors can hide in a special blind to watch a disabled bald eagle matings pair, Ross and Marilyn, and their family. The chicks they raise fly off to the wild (though return for occassional visits).
Director Peter Dubacher started rescuing birds here in 1975. Friendly supporters drop by with food, building supplies as well as money.
When chicks aren’t around, the emus still the show. These giant gangly birds are very curious about their human visitors. About human height, they seem to want to dance with you from the other side of the chain link fence. They twist their necks around to get a closer view and beg for food.
About 40% of the birds here couldn’t make it in the wild and so will live out their lives here.
Where to See Neat Animals in the Northeast
I am reading Feathers of Hope right now and can not wait to give my copy to my daughter and son in law. This past season they found a baby robin beside the road cowering as cars roared by and raised him and taught him things he would need to survive in the wild. It was a marvelous experience for the entire family to watch little Robert Robin mature and take flight with several peers who showed up at their house one day and spent several days getting to know Robert and enticing him to go off with them. He has returned once or twice for a brief contact with his “mom” and “dad” who saved his life and taught him how to use human ways to survive and also bird ways a truly marvelous experience for all concerned.
emus are really a crazy birds and it dance early morning and it has lots of fun in the early morning
To know more on emus nature and emu birds picture