During a meditation the other day a golden eagle turned up. Totally out of the blue, I'd never had that happen, nor had I expected that!
It had me off-kilter a bit for a few secs, like "errr... okay? What am I to do with this?"
But I allowed it to unfold and it was beautiful. The eagle helped me, was there for me. And absolutely a golden eagle. I had to use Google to find out what these are called in Dutch. Turns out we don't have them over here in Western Europe, except for Scotland and Eastern Europe.

Anywho... the same day or day after I was presented with a vid on... a golden eagle by YouTube???!!
I clicked, watched, and was sold, haha.
The vid was from a wildlife rescue centre in Utah, mostly birds of prey, but also other animals. The owner & founder has a golden eagle that he can fly with, hunting. One of the few who has all the paperwork for that.
I never knew how much was involved to become a qualified falconer let alone a falconer of golden eagles!

I've been watching clip after clip after clips for days on end now, all on YouTube. It is so beautiful to watch him heal these birds and release them back into nature!
Sometimes a broken wing, concussion (hit by a car), lead pallets from shooting which poisons the birds, starvation and so on and so forth.

He did a longer vid on the psychology of falconry which was stunning. He makes connections to how it's the same as dealing with your children, students, employees etc. and damn, he's totally spot on!!

Apart from the rescue and hawking he also educates people so they get more understanding and respect for these birds. He then takes a bird with him so people can see one up close and personal.
When he releases one back in the wild he tends to invite groups and then chooses one that can release it, even one as big as a golden eagle!
This way people also get a different view and understanding.
Which is VERY necessary as one hawk was found/brought in that had been hit by a car, dazed, and then some MF had grabbed it by its wing, damaging the feathers, and simply ripped out its tailfeathers? WTF? Only 2 tailfeathers left.
Who does such a thing? You have to be utterly cruel to do that to another living being.
That bird needed a year to recover and grow new feathers.
So respect and understanding for these creatures is very much needed!

I LOVE what he's doing. I've sat here moved to tears, bawling my eyes out. Lots of paper tissues haha.
If you're interested in any of this, here's the channel:

http://www.youtube.com/c/GowildlifeOrg/videos