The heron and the hawk

Fri, 10 Jul 2026 12:21:41 +0200

Around the turn of the millennium, me and my girlfriend at the time, Angelica, decided to spend one Easter vacation in Aegina, a beautiful and serene little island just south of Athens. During that period Angelica was volunteering for the Greek Center for the Protection of Wild Animals (Ελληνικό Κέντρο Περίθαλψης Αγρίων Ζώων / ΕΚΠΑΖ / EKPAZ) in Athens, and we had both been volunteers at Greenpeace Greece for several years already. As such, we were in a sense insiders of the relatively small environmental movement of Greece. So, we were told that while we were in Aegina we could go visit the new facilities of EKPAZ on the island. We were told that they would be closed to the public due to Easter, but we could go, and the personnel would be there, and they would be happy to receive us and show us around.

In previous years, EKPAZ had been housed in a very old building complex in the town of Aegina. Built in 1828, it was originally an orphanage, then used for various purposes such as military academy, psychiatric hospital, quarantine station, refugee asylum, etc. but for most of its existence, that is from 1880 until 1985, it was a jailhouse. (Little known fact: for most of that time, it was primarily receiving political prisoners.) After it was shut down in 1985 it fell into disuse. In 1990 it was granted to EKPAZ for use as an animal hospital.

I have heard that the conditions in it were not particularly nice, and this was probably putting it mildly.


Aerial view of the old jailhouse of Aegina; photo from lifo.gr


Street view of the old jailhouse of Aegina; photo from lalaounistravel.com


Inside view of the old jailhouse of Aegina during the EKPAZ years; photo from ethnos.gr

In 2001 the municipality started making plans to turn the old jailhouse into a museum, so they had EKPAZ relocate. This time they granted them a recently constructed building complex located on a gentle hill-side, in a somewhat remote and inland location of Aegina. It was originally intended as a cultural center, but it had never materialized as such.


The new facilities of EKPAZ, early 2000s; photo from ekpaz.com


The new facilities of EKPAZ, (zoom,) early 2000s; photo from ekpaz.com

I cannot say that I know for sure how and why this cultural center that nobody needed had popped up in the middle of nowhere, but it seemed to me like one more of those projects that are unfortunately common in Greece, where European Union funds are secured for projects that have no purpose other than to appropriate such funds. The standard play is that a proposal is submitted for a work for which the EU will provide a 50% subsidy; the work is completed for only 10% of the cost, another 20% or so goes to pay taxes, (because invoices are issued for 100% of the cost, to justify the 50% funding,) and the remaining 20% or so, which may amount to hundreds of thousands of Euros, goes into the pockets of those involved in the fraud. The end-result is invariably useless. In this particular case, the location was too remote to be practical, and keeping the facilities running would have required a regular flow of money for which there was no budget; so, instead of letting the facilities rot, they let EKPAZ have them. One thing is sure: for EKPAZ, the modern housing constituted a huge improvement over the old jailhouse.

And so on Easter Sunday of 2002 we went to visit those facilities. We were greeted by a handful of friendly faces; some were employees, I think most were volunteers. They had all gathered there on that day for a certain Easter Sunday tradition that is very strong in Greece: the roasting of the lamb.

This is one of the many paradoxes of the environmental movement in Greece: in any other country of the Western World, a large percentage of the people involved with environmentalism, and especially people involved with the protection of animals, would be vegetarian if not vegan. This would prevent the slightest notion of any kind of roasting of any kind of animal from coming up even as a suggestion, but not in Greece, which has a virtually non-existent vegetarian culture. As a result, it is perfectly possible in Greece to see people attending to injured wild animals with determination, devotion and self-sacrifice, while at the same time, a little bit further away, the exact same people are roasting an animal that had the misfortune of being neither wild, nor injured.

This is not to say that either me or Angelica were vegetarians; from a dietary perspective, we were just like the rest: omnivorous. However, we did apparently have some slightly different sensitivities. We did not indicate any great interest in standing around the roasting of the lamb, because it is, quite frankly, a ghastly sight to behold. So, it was agreed that one of the volunteers would give us a tour of the facilities.

Being admitted in the place, despite it being closed to the public on that day, and then having a tour guide all for ourselves, made us feel like we were guests of honor. We were very grateful for that.

First we visited the veterinarian's cabin. Is was a tiny house which may have consisted of just one room. (And maybe a bathroom?) It was furnished with an examination table, medical equipment, and shelves with supplies. I do not know much about medical stuff, but my impression was that it was decently equipped and well kept. The lady working there was Maria Ganoti, a well-known figure in environmental circles in Greece. I suppose that when you are in this kind of job you don't take a day off, because you know that the injured animals will not stop arriving just because it is your day off.

Sure enough, we had hardly introduced ourselves when I saw through the window a motorcycle arriving outside and parking in a hurry. It was a BMW GS 1000, as huge and formidable as expensive. The rider, dressed in impeccable (and also quite expensive) motorcycle gear got off the saddle, picked up a carton box from the luggage compartment, and rushed into the clinic.

He was a very tall, and very handsome young man. His long hair and unshaved look did not manage to make him look particularly rough; you could tell he was a rich kid living a good life. I thought that he might be some kind of celebrity who chooses to invest his free time in activities with a noble cause instead of whatever it is that celebrities otherwise do with their free time. In poor countries like Greece where disposable income is rare, people tend to have more pressing needs to attend to than the environment or the well-being of animals; thus, the affluent tend to be over-represented within the tiny environmental movement.

Heck, come to think of it, even I can be considered as an example of this phenomenon: oh look, what a coincidence, I was also there on a BMW motorcycle, albeit one of about half the size, and less than half the price, but nonetheless a symbol of almost certainly making ends meet™. I had to acknowledge that my comparatively decent salary of a Software Engineer gave me the luxury of not worrying about the rent at the end of each month. Quite often we are not aware of privileges we enjoy.

The motorcycle man raised his arms with great purpose to hand the box to Maria. She took it, and he lowered his arms as someone whose mission had been accomplished. He stayed to see what was going to happen with the content of the box. We were all very curious to see what was in it.

Maria opened the box, reached inside, and took out one of the most beautiful creatures I have seen in my life. It was a little falcon. His plumage was not particularly fancy, just shades of grey, (so, probably male,) but around his eyes and at the base of the beak he had these incredibly bright orange pigments that made him look completely out of this world. (Either that, or, I thought, I do not really know much about this world.)

According to research I did for the purposes of this post more than two decades later, he must have been a Red-footed falcon (falco vespertinus). The Greek name appears to be Μαυροκιρκίνεζο. The photo that I found barely does any justice to what my eyes saw back then: this photo is very nice; what I saw was incredible.


Red-footed falcon, photo by Michele Mendi, from lipu.it

Maria held the little falcon in her hands and with her fingers she carefully felt every millimeter of it. Within a few moments she knew what was wrong with the little fella: he had a broken wing. She started to apply a bandage that would immobilize it and let it heal, and she did it with such dexterity that it was obvious that she had done the same thing an uncountable number of times before. We were very lucky and grateful to be given the opportunity to witness this incident and to see her at work.

We proceeded to a building where many injured wild birds were kept. There were storks, cranes, flamingos, swans, herons, pelicans, and other kinds of birds that I don't even know their names. They all seemed pretty miserable. Our guide assured us that they were all going to make it, they just had to stay in the facility for a while to recuperate, but they would eventually regain their health and they would be released back in the wild.

EKPAZ was performing releases of birds in the wild roughly twice a year, and sometimes they organized them as events that people could attend and witness. We had actually been to such an event once.

She said that all these birds were there because they had been injured by birdshot, despite all of them belonging to species that are never legal to hunt.

This is the sad reality of "sport" hunting in Greece: laws and regulations exist like in any other civilized country, but people regard them as having a decorative function, while the state lacks the resources necessary to enforce them.

The last time that a Greek chose to die in order to abide by the laws was two and a half thousand years ago.

Keeping such a large number of birds in an enclosed space had a very unfortunate consequence: the room stank with not just the worst stench that I have ever experienced in my life, but I would dare say, a stench that was worse than any stench imaginable. Our guide did not seem to have much of an issue with it; I suppose it is something that you get used to after a while; but while I stood there, I started feeling like I was under physical assault. When we exited the building I was very glad to be able to breathe again.

Then we started walking down a paved path, towards a little house that stood apart from the rest of the buildings.

The path had a beautiful view through an opening between two hills. One could see some more of the hills of Aegina, then a bit of sea (the Saronic gulf between Aegina and the Peloponese,) then out in the distance a Peloponesian mountain range, and then out in the extreme distance yet one more Peloponesian mountain range. For the needs of this post I managed to find a photo showing that exact same view.


Paved path with a view, leading to small house; photo from ekpaz.com

The path led us in front of the outdoor cages, which were for animals that were in a bit better shape than the ones in the enclosed building.

I think we saw only one animal that was not a bird; it was a wild boar.

So, a very reasonable question to ask is how come the vast majority of animals under the care of EKPAZ are birds. I never posed this question to anyone from EKPAZ, but I think the answer has to be something along these lines: we humans have almost wiped out all indigenous wildlife in Greece, and continue to murder whatever small populations are left; however, by now, indigenous wild animal populations are so small, that injured ones in need of care are very few and far apart. In contrast, almost all birds are migratory; the north ends of their migration paths are far away north of Greece, and the south ends are far away south, which means that for a large part of the year they live elsewhere. This in turn means that as much as we would want to, we do not get the chance to kill them. But on each migration season, the land is suddenly inundated with large numbers of wildlife available for the slaughter. So, in a few words, the over-representation of birds in EKPAZ probably reflects the fact that they are mostly visitors, while almost no other wildlife lives in the country anymore.

That having been said, EKPAZ will provide care for any wild animal as long as they have the means for it. Years ago they used to have wolves, up to nine of them at one time. However, in 1992, an organization specifically for the protection of bears and wolves was founded in Northern Greece: Arcturos. So, soon afterward, EKPAZ handed their wolves over to Arcturos.

I was once told that at one point, EKPAZ even had an arctic fox. Nobody really knows for sure how an arctic fox was found roaming the streets of suburban Attica, but in all likelihood she had escaped from some unknown, clandestine, and highly illegal operation that raises them for their fur.

EKPAZ has no means of providing care to aquatic animals, but luckily there are other environmental organizations in Greece that care for those, such as The Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece, (Archelon,) the Hellenic Society For The Study And Protection Of The Monk Seal (MOm,) a few others for dolphins and other cetaceans such as whales, etc.

Back to our tour of the EKPAZ facilities, I was glad to see that the cages for the large birds were spacious, allowing them some freedom of movement. Especially the one for the vultures was huge. We stopped in front of it to look at the vultures. I had never seen one before.

Although vultures are very rare in the wild, they represent a significant portion of all guests at the facilities. This is most probably happening because people hate them. I suppose that "sport" hunters who would have it at nothing to shoot a stork might even go out of their way to shoot a vulture. Of course arbitrary human prejudice reigns supreme over naturalist nonsense like compassionate conservation, respect for all of nature, etc.

I could not help but briefly recall the statistics:

Of all birds that are hit by birdshot:
- Four out of five are killed instantly.
- One out of five sustains injuries.
  - Of those that sustain injuries:
    - A tiny fraction like 3% to 5% survives.
    - The vast majority die of their injuries later, unless they are rescued.
      - For a bird to be rescued:
        
        It must be found by humans. (The vast majority are never found.)
        
        The humans must have nothing to do with hunting.
        
        The humans must go out of their way to inquire what one is supposed to do when one finds an injured wild animal.
        
        The humans must find out that one is supposed to contact EKPAZ.
        
        The humans must contact EKPAZ, which will give them instructions on how to put the animal in a carton box, and ship it to EKPAZ, usually by domestic bus route, where bus drivers sympathetic to the EKPAZ cause agree to transport those boxes like unescorted cargo, but free of charge;
        
        The humans must, in their own free time, do what is necessary to have the animal shipped to EKPAZ;
        
        The animal must be still alive by the time it arrives at EKPAZ.

Those few birds that had the incredible luck to arrive at EKPAZ still alive, were the ones that we were looking at in the cages in front of us.

So, for each bird in these cages, thousands of other birds had died of birdshot injuries in the wild, and five times that many more had been shot dead by hunters.

All of them belonging to species that are illegal to hunt due to being designated a conservation status of vulnerable, endangered, or worse.

What the fuck is wrong with humans?

We started walking along the last segment of the path, towards the little house at the end of it.

Already from a distance I had noticed something strange: in front of the little house were two birds; one stocky and brownish, the other slender and white. They were just standing there, motionless, a couple of meters from each other, doing nothing in particular. I found that very odd. I looked hard, to rule out the possibility that they were in cages that I could not discern from a distance, and indeed they were not; the birds were obviously standing in the open. I could not explain this. I would have expected those birds to either be in cages, or to have flown away.

As we drew closer, I could tell that the brown one was a hawk, and the white one was a heron. Each of them looked quite all right; it was not like they were missing plumage or body parts. How could these two birds, belonging to very different species, be simply standing there, in the open, at such close proximity to each other? Had they come to eat the food intended for the birds in the cages? Unlikely, because Aegina is hundreds of kilometers away from their natural habitats: the heron likes rivers, lakes, and sweet-water wetlands, while the hawk roams the woodlands of mainland Greece, not the barren islands of the Aegean sea. So, what on earth were those two doing there?

Seeing that they were standing motionless, I seriously considered for a moment that they might be embalmed. Of course it was preposterous to think that EKPAZ would have placed two embalmed birds there, but not nearly as preposterous as to suggest that these two birds would have chosen by themselves to be standing there. However, I soon noticed a tiny bit of movement, so the embalmment theory was disproven too, and I was back at simply finding this a very bizarre sight to behold and not knowing what to make out of it.

The puzzlement became only greater as we approached, and the birds did not seem to have any interest in flying or even walking away.

I took some comfort in noticing that our guide was walking towards the birds without showing any signs of surprise, so I figured that this is normal, and it somehow ends up having a logical explanation, which was about to be revealed.

We were now standing among the birds. Both of them looked healthy and beautiful. Their shiny eyes, those marvels of nature that give them a 360 degree view of the world with a level of detail that humans could only imagine, were paying no particular attention to us, as we were practically towering above them.

For the purposes of this post I found photos of two birds that look exactly like those two at EKPAZ.


A white heron (little egret) (Wikipedia); Image credit: wikipedia.org


A hawk (long-legged buzzard) (Wikipedia); Image credit: wikipedia.org

Our guide went inside the little house and came out holding a bag of some kind of birdfeed. She poured some of it into a container on the ground nearby, producing the distinctive sound of dozens of little pellets hitting metal. The heron walked over to it and started eating.

Then she went back inside, and came out holding a piece of raw meat. She put the meat on top of a rock that must have been placed there for that purpose, and then she lifted the hawk with her bare hands, (the hawk, incredibly, not minding at all,) and placed the hawk on the rock, right on top of the meat. The hawk kneaded the meat with his feet, and then started ripping the meat with his claws and eating it.

Then, our guide explained.

She said that both those birds were in good health, except that they were blind. She said that even though there was nothing obviously wrong with them, their optic nerves had been destroyed by birdshot. Then she said something that struck me as both an interesting fact that was completely new to me, and at the same time as a very self-evident truth that I really should have been able to guess by myself:

A blind bird will not fly.

So, those two were among the substantial percentage of guests of EKPAZ that were going to stay there for life; they were never going to be released.

I turned my face towards the lady as to keep my welling eyes concealed behind my sunglasses, but to no avail, as gravity dragged the teardrops down my face.

We moved on.

The friendly people of EKPAZ invited us to stay and have lunch with them, but added that we would have to wait some more, because the lamb had taken a lot longer than they had expected to properly roast. So, it was not ready yet, despite it being something like 3 o'clock in the afternoon. To their credit, they were inexperienced in this; who knows, perhaps none of them had roasted a lamb before. We thanked them, but decided to return to the town, but due to a combination of other factors, having to do with the whole experience of visiting the facilities being slightly overwhelming, and neither of us particularly caring for lamb, or for traditions. But we were both very thankful for having been invited and given the tour.

Cover image: Heron and Hawk, created by Google Gemini from a prompt by michael.gr, then traced using InkScape to convert to svg, and then edited as svg by michael.gr.

Greece on Michael's Blog

The heron and the hawk