Flyaway Home

What would you do if you spotted an injured bird by the side of the road? Would you stop and try to rescue it? Just keep going and assume the next person will help? Or would you call someone?

In New York's Hudson Valley, that someone might very well be Suzie Gilbert, who has made healing and releasing wild birds a way of life. After moving away from the big city in 1990, her passion for animals—feathered ones in particular—led her to volunteer at the Hudson Valley Raptor Center, where she cared for injured birds of prey.

"I think birds are amazing, beautiful creatures," says Gilbert. Despite an hour-long drive each way, "I ended up volunteering there for 11 years. The raptors just got their hooks into me, so to speak."

During that time, Gilbert and her husband had a son and a daughter. And, as the children grew older, it became more and more difficult for her to make the trip to the Center. Then a crazy notion took hold: Why not start her own facility for birds? In her new book, Flyaway: How a Wild Bird Rehabber Sought Adventure and Found Her Wings, she chronicles, with humor and heart, what it was like to turn her backyard (and at times her bathroom, kitchen, living room …) into a bird sanctuary.

"I studied for my test, got my license and opened what I thought was going to be just a very small operation," explains Gilbert with a chuckle. "I didn't think at first that I would take in injured birds. I thought I would build a flight cage so that injured birds who had recovered could practice flying. It was going to be mostly feeding and maintenance, making sure everything was OK and then releasing them."

But then she would get those inevitable phone calls. "I kept saying, 'Only this one more time. I'll just [take in an injured bird] one more time.' But someone else would call and say, 'It's you or nothing.' That got me."

Bit by bit, her family became integral to her mission, as Flyaway dominated most of her time (not to mention her house). The children in particular were drawn to the work, her son often lending a reassuring hand (or two) with a panicked bird of prey and her daughter finding ways to convince finicky hatchlings to eat.

Along the way, her children have had firsthand experiences with compassion and the cycle of life. "They have helped me through a lot of trying times," says Gilbert. "I try not to get attached to various birds, but of course I do. And sometimes they die, and you're really sad. And then life goes on. It's also good to take a tiny little baby songbird and watch it grow up. The changes are miraculous."