By Marianne Sullivan, Source Senior Staff
Writer:
This is the story of
two Steve’s–one an osprey and the other his rescuer–and the small army of
volunteers who worked through the night to save the bird.
The story begins
with Scott Erickson of Westbrook who was fishing along the Falls River
Sunday, Aug. 3. From his kayak, Erickson had just cast his line into the water.
He hooked “something big,” he thought, and then noticed something flapping
above him. He turned to look, lost his fish, but spotted an osprey struggling
in a tree high above him.
“I asked myself,
‘What am I looking at?’ It took me a few seconds to realize it was an osprey
and it was trapped, hanging upside down in a tall tree and struggling to get
free,” Erickson recalled. “I can climb, but not to that height. The bird was in
trouble.”
He called the state
trooper’s office in Essex and left a message
describing the bird and its plight.
The trooper’s office
called Joe Heller, the town’s animal control officer. Heller was out of town
but picked up the message on his phone about 30 minutes later. He headed out to
the site. He also called Grace Krick of Deep River,
a licensed wildlife rehabilitator he had called upon in the past.
“She headed right
down, as she always does,” Heller said.
Krick, at the same
time, called Christine and Todd Secki, wildlife rehabilitators from
Killingworth.
“Grace put together
a team and we all headed down to the pond. We found the bird, but it was so
high up–60 to 70 feet–and it was getting dark. Our efforts just weren’t
enough,” Heller explained.
In the meantime,
Erickson had left the river, packed up his kayak, and then circled back to
check the bird. He found Heller, Krick, and the Seckis, but learned the osprey’s
rescue looked darn near impossible.
As Heller, Krick,
and Christine Secki stood on the bank, Todd Secki rowed out into the water to
see if a rescue could be accomplished from there. It could not, and night was
closing in.
“Todd had a ladder
and ropes and some climbing gear, but we could not reach the osprey. It was
struggling, hanging upside down. There was so little we could do. Todd was
upset and reluctant to leave the bird in that state. It was pitch dark by now.
We agreed to meet at the pond again at 5 the next morning,” Heller said.
Krick and Christine
Secki had set off on another emergency rescue call. Also upset to leave the
osprey, Christine called a neighbor who she thought might have the appropriate
climbing gear and a pole saw.
“He gave me the name
and number of his tree guy, so I called him. This was probably 10 or 10:30 at
night. When I explained our problem with a bird in distress and hoped he might
help. I said we were all meeting again at 5 a.m. to try a rescue. He said, ‘Why
wait until morning? Let’s do it now.’”
The tree climber was
Steve Leninski of Deep River.
“I’m pretty much
retired from climbing now, but when I heard about this bird I knew I would not
be able to sleep that night. I keep my gear in my trunk, just in case. I called
a friend because I would need help with the ropes. He had another friend with
him. They both came down,” Leninski said.
What he found when
he arrived at about 11:30 p.m. was an osprey trapped atop a 60 to 70 foot honey
locust tree “full of thorns.”
Christine Secki
said, “When Steven said he wanted to do the rescue immediately I knew he was
our kind of guy. We headed back to the site. My husband rowed out into the pond
and Steve strapped on his climbing spikes. His hat had a small head lamp on it
and within just a short while he was up that tree and sawing off the branch
with the osprey.”
Leninski said his
guys on the ground worked the ropes as needed and he climbed through the dark
with only his brim cap light for illumination. He, and everyone else involved
in this rescue, assumed the osprey was entangled in fishing line. It was not.
This was a banded bird and a slim branch had wedged its way between the band
and the bird’s leg.
Using two ropes,
Leninski cut the branch and then gently lowered the bird and branch down and
out over the water and eventually to Secki in his boat. Sometime after midnight
this small assembled group of rescuers headed home.
“I got back to the
site at 4:30 in the morning to discover the bird had been rescued,” Heller
said. These people are unbelievable, really amazing.”
Krick took the
osprey home with her, where it was recovering last week.
“Ospreys do not
usually do well in situations like this. There is less than a 50 percent
recovery rate, but he was up and standing on his leg the next day. I think
that’s a good sign.”
She believes the
bird is a young male. Gender is hard to determine in osprey without a blood
test.
“This one is on the
small side. Ospreys generally stand about 21 to 24 inches high and have
wingspans from 4.5 to 6 feet. We’ll have to see how this leg heals. He needs
his talons to fish. It may be some time before we know about the extent of
recovery,” Krick said.
Christine Secki was
very clear as she recalled the events of that evening.
“The real hero of
this piece is Steve Leninski,” she said.
For his part,
Leninski said he wanted to name the osprey Steve. And it is.
Christine and Todd
Secki have established A Place Called Hope, a raptor rehabilitation and
education center. They will hold an open house and fundraiser this Sunday at
the center, 254 Roast Meat Hill Road, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Featured “guests”
will include a redtailed hawk and two owls.
Pictured: This is
Steve, an osprey rescued by a small army of volunteers Aug. 3. He was spotted
hanging upside down and trapped at the top of a honey locust tree above the Falls River.
At last report, he is on the mend.
Photo courtesy of Grace Krick