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The Howell Touch
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The logger inspected the towering pine,
estimating how many board feet he could mill from the tree that was no more than a
germinating spore when his grandfather was born. In a matter of minutes the chain saw
toppled the stately conifer and the forest worker began delimbing. As he neared the
tapered top he noticed a mass of interwoven sticks he didn't see during his survey. In the
middle of the large nest he found a defiant and uninjured osprey chick. Surprised and
saddened by the discovery of the now- orphaned raptor, he radioed dispatch for a warden.
In Aroostook County there is one location
where a licensed facility exists for eagle recovery--the A. E. Howell Wildlife
Conservation Center & Spruce Acres Refuge in North Amity, founded and managed by Art
and Dot Howell.
This is not a game farm or zoo
environment, but an open-to-the-public rehabilitation center that focuses on
reestablishing wild animals to their natural environment. They also provide specialized
care for permanent residents who can't be returned to the wild due to debilitating injury,
or inability to deprogram from too much human familiarization before arriving at the
refuge. Whether by accident or design, human involvement accounts for the majority of Art
and Dot's charges.
The center is as much about the character
and dedication of this philanthropist couple as it is about the care of wildlife. This
54-acre sanctuary receives no government support, depending on the generosity of
memberships, donations and business grants. During Art's personalized tour of the
facility, the 59-year-old cancer survivor, who battles MS and walks with a cane due to a
fused hip, recounted the financial hardships his family has endured to fund the center.
Like remortgaging their home several times to keep the refuge running, and when that means
was no longer available how they cried together about having to close, only to receive a
$9000 prayer-answering donation from Philip Morris Company the next day.
 Examples
of animals that are permanent residents are a bald eagle with an amputated wing broken
when it flew into a tower guide wire. A wolf, with no business being in a domestic
environment, released by its Maine owner who could no longer care for the beautiful
canine. And the epileptic bobcat named BC, a natural outcast abandoned by its mother,
prone to seizures, now flourishing with veterinary treatment.
You would think that someone involved with
saving wild animals would be an anti-everything type, making sportsmen out to be bad guys.
Not so with this hunter, card-carrying NRA member and former police officer. To the
contrary, he can share hunting adventures with the rest of us, and is visited by local
guides instructing sports on game identification and humane shot placement.
As Art caresses the ears of BC while the
37-pound male bobtail purrs in his arms like any house cat, and Dot handfeeds a baby robin
on a counter just feet away, they proudly share their rehabilitation successes. Triumphs
like releasing 15 bald eagles since they began the raptor recovery in 1990; the building
of an 1800-foot-fenced moose enclosure, a 92% rehabilitation and reintroduction rate; and
the traveling education program with BC and a bald eagle as presentation centerpieces.
The rehabilitators are especially proud of
innovative ideas that revolutionized the care and return of moose and black bears to the
wild. Moose do poorly in captivity. Conventionally, the center's first moose enclosure was
primarily coniferous and the moose did not fare well. Bucking popular wisdom, the adjacent
new compound of hardwoods allows them to thrive. He teaches bears to hibernate, mastering
a technique that has released 52 viable bears to the wild.
~Wayne Selfridge is a seasoned
outdoorsman who has hunted and fished throughout the world as a military veteran. He
works in law enforcement and also serves as the Sporting
Journal's Northern Sales Manager. He is also a member
of the Friends of Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge.
© 2000 Northwoods Sporting Journal
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