♪ [birds and crickets calling] WILLEM: Every September, in the forests of northern New England, a gathering takes place.

♪ ♪ [birds and crickets calling] Birders get together hoping to spot broad-winged hawks.

♪ The hawks know it's time to leave and begin their journey south.

Somehow, they already know where the 4,500-mile flight will take them... ♪ [rainforest animals calling] to the rainforests of South America.

♪ [rainforest animals calling] INTY: [speaking in Spanish] The birds are like a symbol of liberty because they don't have anything that's repressing them.

They're in the air in space.

♪ WILLEM: We're setting out to follow the migration of the broad-winged hawks from their summer home in New Hampshire to their wintering grounds in Ecuador.

Along the way, we'll hear the stories of people touched by their mysterious flight.

DAVE: The whole idea of migration kind of draws in the importance of how we're all interrelated.

These birds are not our birds.

They’re birds that spend the summers here.

♪ ♪ [rainforest animals calling] WILLEM: These are the forests of Ecuador's Choco-Andean region.

Lying just north of the equator, on the western slopes of the Andes Mountains, the area is rich with wildlife.

[rain falling] Within the dense forest is a reserve the Maquipucuna Reserve.

Birders from around the world come here because there are a few better places to see birds.

♪ [bird calling] BARBARA: Ecaudor is the country in the world with the fourth- largest number of birds.

It's the fourth in the world, and it's a tiny country about the size of Illinois.

WILLEM: Barbara Butler's with the Butler Foundation.

[conversation] Its mission is to protect wildlife habitat and educate people about the natural world they live in.

♪ [conversation] ♪ [rain falling] Barbara's late father, Thomas Butler, bought the 15,000 acres of forest that make up the Maquipucuna Reserve.

BARBARA: He was one of the early people in the United States not the only one, but one of the early ones to recognize the incredible diversity and the ease in which you can see so many different interesting birds.

♪ [man calling birds] So, his dream was to help preserve land so that for the birds.

So, to preserve this incredibly rich environment.

♪ [rainforest animals calling] [loons calling] We’re still hearing the loons.

They haven't gone yet.

WILLEM: We begin the journey of the broad-winged hawks in New Hampshire.

It's what the Butlers call home.

[Marisa imitating crane call] That's Barbara's daughter, Marisa Rivero, imitating a sandhill crane.

She lives with a disability and a passion for birds.

The ladder she got from her grandfather, Thomas.

MARISA: He gave me the opportunity to... go and look at birds with him.

I feel... so blessed that, I guess, in a way, that I have this knowledge of birds from him that he passed on to me.

WILLEM: Thomas’ own discovery of birds happened at an early age.

As a schoolboy, he wrote this report on bird migration between the Americas.

BARBARA: He never forgot this report.

It just was such an inspiration.

He always, after that, wanted to go to South America and see some of these amazing birds.

He got on to it young; very young.

Since he was a kid, he was interested in birds.

♪ WILLEM: Over time, Thomas’ fascination with migrating birds took flight.

He shared that passion with family and with strangers ♪ BARBARA: He was tireless in telling people about it, and particularly, later on in New Hampshire, working with the Nature Conservancy and Audubon in New Hampshire and trying to get more and more people up in New Hampshire interested in the Americas.

You know, birding as America’s thing and not just a local thing.

And making the interconnections and having people come to Maquipucuna from here as much as possible so that they would see, as he did, the fact that we are interconnected.

♪ [rainforest animals calling] EXPERT: Our first guest is called a broad-winged hawk.

WILLEM: The interconnection Thomas Butler saw between people and nature happens every year at a school near Meredith, New Hampshire.

Dave Earler is a naturalist with Squam Lake’s Natural Science Center.

He's with the fourth grade class of Inter-Lakes School.

DAVE: Over the years, the teachers have done so many different things, and they incorporate it across the whole broad spectrum for those first few weeks of school.

So, they're doing art, math, social studies, and everything kind of revolves around, you know, broad-winged hawks.

EXPERT: How far do you guys think that the broad-winged hawk might travel?

Or you can even name to where they may fly to if you want.

WILLEM: Dave says he believes nature is the ideal conduit between children and discovery.

MAN: Last question.

GIRL: Do they go up really high, like near the clouds, or like, lower than that?

DAVE: Many kids don't have the opportunity to go out and just experience nature on their own, which is sad because without children growing up with some contact with the natural world, I think there's a real risk that they assume that they're not part of that natural world, and they really are.

♪ [chatter] GIRL: We've seen eight turkey vultures and three broad-winged hawks.

Oh!

Bird.

Bird.

Bird.

Over there!

GIRL TWO: Looking forward to see a whole bunch of hawks GIRL: Right above the school!

TEACHER: I know that they have those broad tails; they have broad wings.

GIRL: Is that one of the ones that go flap flap flap slow?

BOY: It has talons, like its feet are really, really sharp.

DAVE: Those are actually songbirds, believe it or not.

(in shock) GIRL: They are?

TEACHER: We saw more today than I saw last year so... that was good.

GIRL: I have good eyesight!

DAVE: The survival of so many species, probably including our own, depends on them understanding that we're a part of this world and how we manage it is going to determine a lot on what is here, not only now, but also, certainly, in the future.

EXPERT: A thermal is where hot air is rising up off the earth.

WILLEM: So, Dave and his staff travel around New Hampshire teaching kids about birds.

Today, they talk about how broad-winged hawks migrate over great distances.

EXPERT: They use those broad wings to catch that hot air that's rising so they can get lift.

DAVE: They don't migrate fast, but they migrate very efficiently because they can take advantage of those air currents.

You know, grabbing an air current, soaring around, getting up to heights probably in excess of 10,000 feet.

WILLEM: But rather than talk about how thermals work, we’ll show you.

♪ [crickets calling] This is Morningside Flight Park in Charlestown, New Hampshire.

I'm here because Steve Prepost assures me we can soar just like a broad-winged hawk.

STEVE: Pleasure to meet you.

WILLEM: Oh.

The pleasure, I hope, will be all mine!

[chuckles] Now, you've been here a while?

STEVE: I've been here a while.

I grew up in the area.

I started flying when I turned 19.

That’s about 14-15 years ago now.

WILLEM: And you're still with it?

STEVE: Still with it.

Flying every day, seven days a week.

WILLEM: Is that right?

STEVE: I love it.

WILLEM: You must love it.

Now we're going to try to do today what hawks do, right?

STEVE: Yeah.

So, we're going to try to catch a thermal, and I'll explain to you how thermals work, and hopefully we'll gain some altitude and show you how they migrate.

WILLEM: Okay.

Hawks need thermals to migrate?

STEVE: Well, they can flap and use all their energy.

They don't need thermals, but if they want to conserve energy, they use that rising air to circle in and climb and they can travel clear across country using very minimal energy.

WILLEM: Isn't that neat?

Okay.

We're going to try to do the same thing?

STEVE: Exactly.

Because we can't flap our wings.

So, we're just like a bird.

WILLEM: I can but they won’t help!

But we're going to get towed to altitude by an ultralight and then STEVE: We're going to release from the ultralight, and then on our descent down, we're going to try to find thermals, and I'll show you how to work the thermal, just like a red-tailed hawk or a broad-winged hawk of any kind, and we'll see if we can go up.

WILLEM: That's great.

Okay, so why don't we do it?

STEVE: Let's do it!

WILLEM: Okay!

STEVE: Are you ready to go?

WILLEM: Yeah.

Are you?

STEVE: I'm ready.

[chuckling] WILLEM: That's more important.

STEVE: Okay.

We're ready.

Let's do it.

Here we go, sir!

Off we go.

♪ Once we get enough air speed, we take off.

Here we go.

WILLEM: Now, this is great.

STEVE: Just like that.

Hehehee.

♪ And now, I gently keep his wheels on the horizon line.

and his rudder in the middle.

Off we go!

WILLEM: Very nice.

♪ I always wondered how it felt to be a bird.

As Dave Earler explained to the students back at Inter-Lakes School, a thermal is a warm air current rising from the ground.

This is great.

We're gaining altitude here in good shape.

The best thermals happen during the fall and spring migrations.

That's when cool nights are followed by warm days.

♪ STEVE: There's actually a hawk right there.

He's in a thermal.

WILLEM: Oh yeah, I see him.

STEVE: And he’s thermaling just like we're going to later.

Beautiful!

WILLEM: Steve's buddy is towing us with an ultralight up to several thousand feet before releasing us.

[propeller whining] STEVE: Now, he has caught a thermal.

That's why the air is so bumpy over here.

But we're actually climbing at a pretty good speed with this lift on my right wing.

WILLEM: A strong thermal can send a glider and pilot skyward quickly up to 1,000 feet a minute.

STEVE: Thermals act like bubbles that release off the ground.

And it’s possible to be in a thermal and have another hang glider pilot or bird come in underneath you and not find the lift.

They’ll sink out and have to land where you can climb all the way to the cloud.

Other times, as the thermal releases, it acts as a column.

When you're flying in the column, anything that comes in underneath you or above you will also climb.

♪ WILLEM: At 5,000 feet, we're released from the ultralight.

STEVE: Haha.

We're free as a bird now.

WILLEM: You’re right.

That was a shock.

STEVE: So, birds end up soaring to save energy.

They don't have to flap because the air is rising faster than they're descending.

Right now, I could feel lift on my right wing.

So, as we move our feet and hips to the right, we can fly in it.

And this is how they circle and stay in the rising air.

Just like this.

WILLEM: Yep.

♪ You know, I'm glad I tossed aside my initial apprehension.

Soaring the thermals just like a broad- winged hawk offers a great perspective on its migration.

♪ [wind rushing by] And these geese down here don't ever bother you?

STEVE: No.

They're migratory geese.

They come in and they hang out here at the flight park until it’s time to move.

WILLEM: They don’t fly with you?

STEVE: No, they don't.

They cannot soar like a like a broad-winged hawk.

They need to have energy to flap.

So, in order for us to land, what we do is we fly faster.

Flying faster gives us extra energy and extra ability to maneuver.

♪ We're going to do a right-hand turn back.

And in order to land down the runway, what we do is we set up at the right place at the right time so we can come in for our landing.

Here we go.

Lots of speed right on our final approach.

Yeeuh!

And then, we gently ease the bar out until there's nothing left.

Then we touch down.

♪ [wheels hitting thick grass] WILLEM: Oh boy!

STEVE: How was that?

WILLEM: Not too bad for an amateur!

STEVE: Okay, my friend, this is the hard part.

Gravity takes over.

Yeah.

Oh.

[laughing] WILLEM: Yes it does.

Oh dear!

STEVE: That was a spectacular flight.

WILLEM: Steve, I can't thank you enough.

Just wonderful.

♪ Across the state, near Concord, New Hampshire, Robert Valliers dreams of soaring.

He spends a lot of time during the migration waiting for a glimpse of a broad-winged hawk.

ROBERT: What is the connection?

Oh, wow!

The wind beneath the wings.

I think... to see one fly and the fascination of what it takes for them to survive, it's kind of a blessing in disguise.

WILLEM: A blessing, because in the early 90s, during Operation Desert Storm, Robert nearly died.

An accident while on duty in a war zone left him disabled, ROBERT: A big beam came flying off a truck and caught me in the left temple.

Shortly thereafter, I suffered an aneurysm, and one thing led to another and... I’m lucky at life.

WILLEM: It was a slow journey back for Robert.

He sat in a rehab center for months, his spirit wounded.

And then came the birds.

ROBERT: It got me walking and got me getting up out of bed.

Needless to say, I had a little son and he was helping me out too, so... You know, he’d tell me, Daddy, there are some birds out there.

Tell me what kind they are.

So, that helped.

[chatter] WILLEM: Now, Robert works for New Hampshire Audubon.

Perched on a watchtower, he connects other people to hawks.

ROBERT: We want more people to see this.

We want more people to... be enriched... and be uplifted, as they do on their thermals.

Thirty-eight birds passed through our site this morning and it was great.

You know, it's something that I can give back to educate others in hopes that somebody else will catch on; in hopes that we can preserve what is natural.

And... our young will see the beauty in it as well.

So, follow the bird.

WILLEM: Robert says every time he spots a migrating hawk, he's reminded of what might have been.

ROBERT: When you go to a war zone and you come back in a stretcher... ♪ you really feel... the fortunate part of life.

♪ You really realize how fragile life is.

This is important because it could be an eagle.

And that's why we need to study the bird longer.

WILLEM: A life healed, one bird sighting at a time.

♪ ♪ ♪ Hawk Mountain Sanctuary is in east-central Pennsylvania.

It's our next stop on the journey of the broad- winged hawk.

KEITH: We're in the Central Appalachians.

These corduroy hills here offer numerous updrafts.

♪ [wind blowing] In the valleys, you have thermals forming.

And on the ridges, when the winds are blowing out of the northwest, you have updrafts.

So, you have an aerial highway.

WILLEM: Keith Bildstein runs the sanctuary at Hawk Mountain.

The lure of the place, he says, draws birders from far beyond these hills.

KEITH: People hear about Hawk Mountain in different ways, and when they get here, we do our very best to try to live up to our reputation as the school in the clouds.

WOMAN: On the far right side of this valley, there are two long slopes, and the farthest one out there is called Pinnacle.

MAN: Out here on the left, you have the big field in the middle that's Hunter's Field.

WOMAN: And then left of it is Left Hunter's Field.

♪ WILLEM: Prior to 1934, however, this area of Pennsylvania, along with its legendary thermals, provided other opportunities.

KEITH: This was a shooting gound the shooting gallery for raptors in the 20s and in the 1930s.

WILLEM: At that time, hunters believed that broad-winged hawks and other raptors competed with them for small game animals.

The state of Pennsylvania responded with a $5 bounty for each hawk killed.

♪ KEITH: And it attracted dozens of hunters on weekends who would come up here, just as birdwatchers come today with their families many times, and shoot as many birds as possible.

♪ The estimates from the time say 3,500 to 5,000 birds a year at this site alone.

And of course, this ridge runs for 300 miles.

So, you can imagine other shooting galleries also adding to the slaughter.

♪ [crickets calling] WILLEM: The practice drew the attention of Rosalie Edge, a conservationist from New York City.

KEITH: She visited the property in the spring of 1934, leased the central 500 acres that year, bought the property outright the next year, and we went from being a killing ground to the world's first sanctuary for birds of prey.

WILLEM: Birders flock to the sanctuary each fall.

There are several sites overlooking the hills of the Appalachian Flyway.

KEITH: We have quite a few visitors, and I think when we last surveyed, I think it was 7% of them were toting binoculars that cost more than a thousand dollars.

So, they come equipped, and they come out with a job.

And the job is to see as many birds of prey as they can.

LAURIE: But it's also about the people coming back together to watch the birds.

A lot of time is spent catching up between flocks.

WILLEM: I'm sitting here at the North Lookout on Hawk Mountain with the Warner Berthoff, retired professor of English and American Studies at Harvard, and who's been coming here for how many years?

[Warner breathes deeply] [Willem chuckling] WARNER: First visit 45 years ago.

Steadily since 1970.

WILLEM: Wow.

Every year?

That's amazing.

WARNER: Oh yeah.

At this time of the year.

WILLEM: Which made it nice that Harvard didn't start classes until after this.

WARNER: It still doesn't start until the 20th or so, and that one week before it opened was a very good week to be away.

[Willem chuckling] LAURIE: Good morning.

I thought I'd give you the update for the morning so far.

We have not had any hawks yet.

We have a fairly thick fog in the North Valley, WILLEM: But what is it?

Why keep coming back year after year for the same show?

WARNER: Well, it's very interesting.

They're very beautiful birds.

You don't want to anthropomorphize them and speak of how wise they are, but their instinctive wisdom of adjusting to air and so on is extraordinary.

♪ WILLEM: Warner and many of his birding friends come to Hawk Mountain expecting to wait... and wait... and wait some more for a bird.

♪ Then comes the prize.

LAURIE: Nice look at a broad-winged hawk here.

He’s coming back again.

WILLEM: This is one of the few broad-winged hawks seen up close today.

Birding is a lot like fishing: patience is important.

So is the weather.

♪ Well, we didn't see many birds at the North Lookout, so we have retreated to the South Lookout and looking for birds here.

And, guess what?

No birds.

However, I'm here with an expert on the subject, Marrianna Popiel, who's an intern here at the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, and she'll have all the answers, like, why no birds, Marrianna?

MARRIANNA: Okay, well, the reason the reason we don't or are not having too many birds today is a result of the cloud cover we have overhead today.

The sun's just not getting down to the Earth and not really heating the earth up.

And the birds, they like to take advantage of the thermals as well as the winds, which we also don't have today.

WILLEM: So, we just sit tight.

We may see one or two yet.

And if the weather clears a little bit, we could see 500, right?

MARRIANNA: That's right.

WILLEM: In the kettle.

MARRIANNA: And I think, in some cases, we've had as many as in the thousands of birds flying by.

WILLEM: God, that'll be great.

♪ ♪ [thunder cracks and rumbles] A passing storm to the north of us, however, probably grounded many of the broad-winged hawks scheduled to fly through the area.

Their journey, it seems, is full of risks and hazards.

♪ [birds calling] KEITH: Broad-wings... they grow up in New Hampshire in June and July.

The young, by August, are starting to coalesce into small groups.

In September, they're going to school at the school of life, and they're not in a yellow school bus or anything like that.

They travel without their parents.

I mean, they're traveling with their friends, but they're going to a place they've never been.

It's on a different continent.

It's not a great surprise that as many as 50% of them will be dead before they have an opportunity to return.

♪ WILLEM: Despite the high mortality rate, the population of broad-winged hawks is healthy.

Keith says that could change if their ecological needs are ignored.

In New Hampshire, I guess we're pretty decent as far as the environment goes.

We certainly have a lot of hawks.

But what we do up there obviously affects what happens here.

KEITH: That's exactly right.

I mean, those are the bedroom communities for our commuters, and having an appropriate habitat a large forested habitat is very important for birds like broad-wings.

And it's important for broad-wings farther south, when they get as far south as southern Texas, Corpus Christi for example, the flock size can be in the tens of thousands.

♪ WILLEM: Which is where the journey of the broad- winged hawk takes us.

♪ ♪ ♪ [excited chatter] PATTY: All the chocolate: that's the secret weapon of our hawk watch actually, any hawk watch.

Yeah.

More chocolate?

Years ago, we had heard when we first started this watch that Hawk Mountain over in Pennsylvania was using chocolate donuts.

[cheering] Every time we bring that chocolate out, hawks were flying.

It was fantastic!

[excited chatter] So now, people come from all over the country, out of state, out of town, around the world, and they bring chocolate!

Have you had your chocolate yet?

WILLEM: Welcome to the annual Celebration of Flight Festival in Texas.

WOMAN: Can you see it with your eye first?

And then you'll know where to look.

DENE: Physically, we’re maybe fifteen miles from Corpus Christi the proper; from downtown.

MAN: Big wide stream.

A hundred wide!

MIKE: Right now, the Celebration of Flight is focused on the broad-wing hawk migration.

MAN: Right there!

PATTY: Oh, look!

Right overhead.

Look right over our heads.

MIKE: And that's the prominent species for the entire season, and the bulk of them move through during this week.

WILLEM: That week is the last of September.

That's when the broad-winged hawks from the eastern flyways converge here.

♪ JOEL: From September the 23rd to the 30th that's a short eight-day window we get about 80% of the total season's flight of broad-winged hawks.

WOMAN: Okay, okay.

Keep looking!

Keep looking because they're still there.

JOEL: And I'm going to tell you, that equals to about 540,000 broad-winged hawks in eight days.

WOMAN: See that crowd out there?

WILLEM: Joel Simon helps coordinate the hawk watch.

JOEL: Location, location, location.

If you really think about it, if you've got four eastern flyways and four western flyways, all of the eastern flyways because the hawks are not going to fly over large bodies of water, they come down, they hit the Gulf of Mexico, follow the coastline.

And this is also called the Coastal Bend.

It's the first place that they can really turn here in Texas and turn to go south.

WOMAN: Oh, they're kettling actually!

Oh, they're kettling right over there.

Yep.

Right above the roof.

WOMAN TWO: Okay.

I can’t see them with my naked eye.

No, I can't.

WOMAN: Look at the post.

WOMAN TWO: The post?

Okay.

Go straight up.

Okay.

Yep.

Okay.

WOMAN: Got it?

♪ WOMAN TWO: Oh my gosh!

Yes!

Yes!

Yes!

WOMAN: Oh, here they come.

Wooh!

WILLEM: And when large numbers of broad-winged hawks pick up a Texas- sized thermal, they form what looks like swirling funnel clouds.

Birders call them kettles.

DENE: They're getting higher at the same time that they're spinning.

It's just an amazing sight.

Probably one of the minor miracles or major miracles, depending on how you look at it.

But sometimes you'll have 10 or 20,000 or even more.

But 10 or 20,000 is not entirely uncommon here in the peak.

They’ll kettle and yet none of these birds ever hit each other while they're flying.

If we could only drive as well as these guys fly, we'd have a much safer world.

[laughing] MAN: Oh yeah.

Wow!

Right up here in this cloud.

[excited chatter] WILLEM: The Festival is an ideal place to track hawk numbers.

Members of HawkWatch International come to Corpus Christi to monitor and count birds.

MIKE: We started to set up this network of sites to monitor that migration to use as a population index tool.

And we can extrapolate a lot about general... ecological health and function.

And then, over time, we also developed an education and outreach department where we do a lot of public education, and we think that that those three things in concert do quite a bit for raptors and our shared environment.

WOMAN: Oh, the whole cloud.

The whole cloud is filled with them.

[drumming and singing] WILLEM: Not far from the observation towers, drummers from the Gulf Coast Indian Confederation welcome the hawks.

[drumming and singing] ♪ [drumming and singing] RUNNING TURTLE: The birds come from where they will, and they bring with them all the blessings.

When our people see the hawk the raptors we hold our right hand.

Some of the nations hold their left hands because that's the side that is closest to their heart, and they receive the blessing of the hawk and place it upon their hearts.

WILLEM: Larry Running Turtle Salazar is a member of the Tsalagi tribe, [also known as the Cherokee].

He travels to the festival to give and receive blessings.

RUNNING TURTLE: So, everywhere they fly, when we see them, we take in what other people from the north left off.

It is a spiritual animal to us.

You know, a lot of our people use the feathers and honor the spirit of the hawk.

♪ I decided to use the pipe, bring up the pipe in full honors of the migration of the hawk.

But not just in full honors of the migration of the hawk, but also to honor the people that love and respect the hawk as well.

So, I blew smoke into their direction so they can receive the blessing of the chanunpa wakan, the sacred pipe.

[drumming and singing] WILLEM: And those blessings continue well into the night.

RUNNING TURTLE: I'll bring ou the pipe again, and I'll pray to the night raptors: the owls you know, the nighthawks.

I pray to them until the night falls completely.

So, if it doesn't end here, it doesn't stop here, it starts here.

WILLEM: By week's end, the bulk of the broad-winged hawks make their way through Texas.

Their journey to South America continues.

WOMAN: Woah.

How nice is that!

WOMAN TWO: Oh that's pretty with that cloud.

♪ [women admiring] ♪ ♪ ♪ [tropical animals calling] WILLEM: We're back now where the story began: in the rainforests of Ecuador.

♪ [tropical animals calling] Two months ago, the broad-winged hawks left New Hampshire.

They flew more than 60 miles a day over schoolyards and apple orchards.

They filled binoculars in Pennsylvania and received blessings in Texas.

♪ [tropical animals calling] Now in Central and South America, the broad-winged hawks disperse into the forests.

♪ [tropical animals calling] BARBARA: It’s stuck with me the feeling out of that interconnection because I think a lot of us, or maybe me and maybe a lot of other Americans, originally think of South America, as so far away and exotic and different, and the tropical forest being absolutely opposite of New Hampshire.

[chuckling] Right?

And then to see the same birds... here!

PAUL: In many things, cooperation between countries in many endeavors is something not that strange.

But when you start talking about a bird and then what's happened in Ecuador has been so interesting with birds.

It started really with birds.

♪ [tropical animals calling] WILLEM: Paul Greenfield sees birds through many lenses.

Marriage brought him to Ecuador from New York City.

as a young man.

PAUL: Getting closer.

WILLEM: The abundance of bird species kept him here.

♪ [rain falling] ♪ [Paul whistling] He's an authority on birds, studying and illustrating them For the book The Birds of Ecuador.

Paul also guides at the Maquipucuna Reserve.

Years ago, he saw the untapped potential that birds offer the people living there.

PAUL: Originally, they have no sense.

Now, you can tell people, including governments, over and over again, that, you know, what you have here is wonderful.

If they don't see it and they can't see the future of that, you get nothing done.

And so, one of the lucky breaks is when this Birds of Ecuador came out and the proof was in the pudding.

You know, you open up a book and you see this book this thick saying, This is a country that's tiny and it’s like any other country in the tropics, and then you realize it's got more than many, many, many other countries in the world.

♪ [rain falling] REBECA: We have communities that will basically sustain their economic future through ecotourism.

♪ [tropical animals calling] Rebeca Justicia is co-founder of the Maquipucuna Reserve.

The 15,000 acres of rainforest that make up the reserve were once owned by a timber company.

They planned to harvest the trees and turn them into broom handles.

But before that happen, the company went bankrupt.

♪ [tropical animals calling] REBECA: Our first goal was to protect 100 hectares.

That was our ideal.

But since we knew that the whole thing was for sale and we learned about the value of this area the ecological value we figured we'd go for the whole thing.

♪ [water falling] And so, we started a nonprofit, and we started raising funds, and that's how the whole thing started.

♪ [water falling] WILLEM: Thomas Butler finished the deal by purchasing 15,000 acres of forest.

The reserve emerged soon after, and with it, a place for birding tourists to go to.

REBECA: Mr.

Butler, who had been in this region for a long time birding, knew and loved this area, and he wanted to do something about conserving this area.

♪ WILLEM: But not everyone living in the area embraced the idea of protected forests.

Many of the long-time residents saw broom handles as income.

Birding and ecotourism, Paul said, they didn't trust.

PAUL: You know, straight off, there’s very little for them.

Just the way it's been, you know, the fact that birdwatchers or tourists and general nature tourists will come to an area, very often there there is no benefit.

And that's one of the very big problems in terms of the a conservation attitude that these people have.

They just don't understand why they should protect the forest because it doesn't benefit them.

REBECA: It took time.

It wasn't really tough, if you're honest, and it was a process.

And basically what we had to show is why it was better than the broom factory.

As I said, it took time because obviously we had to show that conservation was better than the alternative.

♪ [rain falling] WILLEM: So, Paul, Rebeca, and others met with leaders of the community.

They talked with them about ecotourism and the value that birds like broad-winged hawks can have on a region's economy.

PAUL: Very often, the initial contact is very negative.

You know, you try to get something across and it's just misunderstood as just another offer of something else that they've heard about through the fact that the governments don’t often do what they say they're going to do.

And, you know, big companies don't do what they say they're going to do.

So, they assume that somebody's going to cheat them.

♪ [tropical animals calling] WILLEM: So, the effort went from explaining the concept to showing.

The reserve began hiring local residents, twenty-four in all, as cooks, administrators, and bird guides.

PAUL: The idea is to start in places where there is some sort of something happening already and, you know, people are visiting in the area.

And then, you can involve the people because if worse comes the worst, it'll stay the same.

And if you improve a little bit, they are already seeing people and those people begin to help them.

And then, they tend to understand.

And it's common sense it’s sort of logical.

REBECA: We were talking about one of our guides who, at the beginning of his career, was a simple night guard, and now he's one of the most, I guess, well-paid freelance bird guides in Ecuador.

At the village level, people like him showing that it can happen has made it a career choice; a possibility.

You know, before, these people would probably say, Well, I'm going to be a farmer.

Some will probably regret that that was the only option they had.

But now, you know, Christian, he's thinking about ecotourism.

He's learning avidly about birds.

So, he’s probably thinking, Well, one day I will have a future.

♪ [tropical animals calling] REBECA: [asking in Spanish] Do you often see broad-winged hawks?

ARCENIO: [speaking in Spanish] Depending on the time, we see the broad-winged hawks, but also roadside hawks and eagles.

♪ [tropical animals calling] BARBARA: Nature is, in a sense, an export.

I mean, it's not an export literally in that people pick it up and take it away and pay for it and then take it to another country.

But better than that, something that stays here for all Ecuadorians to enjoy as well.

But it's something that people all over the world, will pay to enjoy.

And so, Ecuador has a resource that could be important to their economy in tourism.

And the lead, as Paul was explaining, would be bird tourism.

♪ [rain falling] PAUL: The Ecuadorians may not think about it as such, but once they understand that this is something that ties us together, and this is something that that adds to our importance and it causes other people from somewhere else to focus on us in this case, migration, but it could be so many other things then all of a sudden it makes a lot of sense.

And then, again, we're back to this thing.

There's a value to that.

♪ [tropical animals calling] WILLEM: During our brief stay in the rainforest, we saw exotic birds... ♪ [birds calling] and some familiar ones, like the broad-winged hawks.

♪ [birds calling] A broad-winged hawk is not going to bring millions of dollars in tourism to Ecuador, but it is part of this whole which is so rich that, you know, the Ecuadorians see this as part of theirs.

♪ [tropical animals calling] ♪ [water flowing] WILLEM: We left the rainforest and traveled to the Andes’ eastern slopes several hours away.

It's dry and dusty here, a sharp contrast to Maquipucuna.

♪ We came to the town of Huaycopungo to meet with an Otavalo indigenous family.

[woman speaking in Kichwa] Barbara Butler is their friend and our translator.

BARBARA: This is the original house.

Just one-room houses are what people used to have just a couple decades ago, and they'd cook on fire in one corner.

[ceramics clattering] WILLEM: José Manuel Tituana and his wife Isabel are farmers and community leaders.

Jheny is their niece.

♪ Starting back several generations with an ancestor fascinated by hawks, the family was given the name Anga by the community.

It means the hawk people.

♪ [wings flapping] ASCIENCIA: [speaking in Spanish] I used to say to myself, Why do they call me Anga’ like that?

I learned by asking my sister and that's how I found out.

ISABEL: [speaking in Spanish] In the family, being called Anga means a family of worth or a family that, in the past, were like presidents of the community; persons of stature who knew how to lead people to organize.

In other words, we grow up as a family, generation after generation.

With our grandchildren, we will continue forward with the knowledge that has been left to us by them.

♪ [thuds] [Jheny calling chickens] WILLEM: Anga remains part of the family name.

♪ [cheering] Throughout South America, birds of prey are national icons.

♪ [students speaking excitedly] For Jheny's generation, however, the important cultural connection with hawks, eagles, and condors is lost.

♪ [sister instructing students] There are people who want to reestablish that connection.

BARBARA: We're in San Rafael, in the province of Imbabura in Ecuador.

And the school we’re at is called... SISTER: Julia María Matovelle.

BARBARA: Matovelle.

SISTER: [speaking in Spanish] BARBARA: And it was started by the Oblatas Sisters.

[sister teaching students] WILLEM: So, Jheny and her school classmates embark on a rare field trip... [students greeting excitedly] [sister teaching students] to a place many of them have never been before.

[sister instructing students] [jesse jingling] [speaking in Spanish] JOEP: She calls herself Reina.

And Reina is also a slob because they live in a place where there are no... The [Andean] Condors are the largest and farthest-flying birds in the world.

They are able to get around with their more powerful wings.

WILLEM: Condor Park sits high on a hill overlooking Jheny's hometown.

♪ [Joep calling bird] Joep Hendriks created the park six years ago.

He sees it as a practical way to teach people about Ecuador's culture, history, and environment.

♪ [Joep calling bird] [jesse jingling] JOEP: We have to be honest, education in Ecuador is really very poor compared to a lot of other countries.

And, even worse, if you think about it, is environmental education.

♪ [jesse jingling] WILLEM: Joep built the park after moving to Ecuador from the Netherlands.

He noticed early on the cultural importance of birds of prey throughout Ecuador.

He also saw widespread neglect of them.

It's very strange.

I see a conflict there.

For example, Indian leaders, especially, are always talking about their Pachamama, their Mother Earth, which is very important.

And then, they work on the land and kill every animal they see, and use a lot of chemicals.

And there is the lack of education.

[animals calling] [bus engine rumbles] [chatter] WILLEM: As with Rebeca and Paul at Maquipucuna, Joep met opposition from local community leaders when proposing a park for raptors.

Rural poverty rates are high in Ecuador.

Farmers, Joep says, worry more about feeding their families than they do about hawks.

JOEP: Poor people; how can somebody think about protecting animals if you hardly can protect your own family?

It's very difficult.

That's also the reason why I told you that, to be concerned about the environment, it also has something to do with the development of people.

It has to do with the development of education.

It has to be part of it.

♪ [jesse jingling] ♪ [chatter] ♪ BARBARA: [asking in Spanish] Which was your favorite?

The hawks?

The falcons?

JHENY: [speaking in Spanish] Condor.

BARBARA: The condor?

Why?

JHENY: [responding in Spanish] I thought about sitting on the back of the condor!

♪ [falconer teaching sudents] JOEP: The demonstrations have a tremendous impact because these children, but also the adults, the parents, and even foreign tourists who come here very often have very limited... thoughts about the raptors.

And when they see these birds flying, it’s very impressive.

JHENY: [speaking in Spanish] I believed I was flying with the condor.

[jesse jingling] [Joep calling bird] JOEP: You see the people changing their minds: Oh, there's something different about raptors and these Andean Condors.

There's something more than just a bird which might kill chickens.

BARBARA: [asking in Spanish] Fly with a condor?

You'd like to fly with the birds?

Would you feel free?

How would you feel flying?

JHENY: [speaking in Spanish] Free.

JOEP: [speaking in Spanish] Look!

It’s a very handsome hawk.

And there are only a few months before his feathers change... WILLEM: The parents and grandparents of these children have their own stories about hawks.

Many of them come from the pages of folklore.

They talk about great clashes between the mountains that surround Condor Park.

ISABEL: [speaking in Spanish] When the mountains used to fight, there was lightning in the afternoon crashing on one side and another.

It lights up.

For example, Cayambe and Cotacachi used to go head-to-head.

They send up illumination and that's how one would know that they were fighting.

You’d also know that Cayambe won when the condor would come down.

And when Cotocachi won, the hawks would go.

That's what they said.

♪ [insects calling] ♪ [birds calling] [birds calling] ♪ WILLEM: We end our journey with the broad-winged hawks in a small village across the valley from Condor Park.

♪ It's where we find Inty Gualapuro.

Inty’s a musician... ♪ and a wildlife artist.

♪ INTY: [speaking in Spanish] What I search for with all my work is to sensitize.

It's what I try to transmit in my work the dignity of life itself; that contact with nature; that harmony that we feel when we are close to her, when we care for her.

[Inty speaking in Kichwa] WILLEM: Inty started drawing early in life.

INTY: [speaking in Spanish] Since I was very little, I started tracing my first marks in the dirt with my hands, with sticks and such.

Later, when I got out of high school, then I was even more inclined to continue painting.

♪ WILLEM: Now, he sells his artwork and the idea of being connected with nature... and, especially, birds.

INTY: [speaking in Spanish] We must always keep in mind that, in this life, as long as we are alive, we are in contact with all the creatures that are in nature, from the smallest insect to the birds, and above all, the mountains.

The birds are like the symbol of liberty because they don't have anything that is repressing them.

They’re in the air in space.

Above all, the condor, for me, is really important because it is one of the most symbolic, most mythic birds, one could say, of the Andean zone.

It is the symbol of power, health, and vitality.

♪ [brushstrokes] WILLEM: Inty’s brushstrokes laid to canvas one at a time remind me how connected we are, of how we blend together people and nature to produce a complete portrait.

♪ They remind me how a hawk born in New Hampshire touches the lives of many people on its journey to faraway places.

♪ [Joep teaching students] Perhaps that's what Thomas Butler saw many years ago when he drew a map of the Americas connected by the migratory routes of birds.

♪ [birds calling] BARBARA: I don't think he was specifically looking for this, originally.

But this opportunity did come to him, and this was one of his favorite places.

And he certainly, from the earliest time, did talk about why it should be important to Americans that these areas be preserved, in part because of the migratory species.

They belong to Ecaudor, and they belong to us as well in the United States and in New England.

That's one of the reasons why it was so important to him to try to do whatever he could to preserve it.

♪ REBECA: I think he was even smarter than having a vision and imposing it.

I think he shared a goal and enabled us Ecuadorians to build that vision with him and make it happen in a way that it will last.

It was not necessarily an imposition, but something like, he enabled us to do something.

♪ ♪