(upbeat music) - HawkWatch International helps conserve our environment through education, long-term monitoring, and scientific research on raptors as indicators of ecosystem health.

Melissa Halvorsen is here to tell us about the upcoming Wings Across the World event, and she brought a special friend.

Melissa, welcome.

Okay, introduce us to this gorgeous bird.

- Of course.

This is Banshee, she is an American barn owl, and she's the perfect raptor ambassador to talk about Wings Across the World, because barn owls are what we call a cosmopolitan species.

And that means they live everywhere, so they're on every continent except for Antarctica.

So she's a great bird to share Wings Across the World.

- I love it.

And I know, unfortunately, a lot of raptors are endangered, so it's really important you do what you do.

- Yeah, so, you know, we're based here in Utah, but we actually do work around the world and that's because, through our research, we've discovered that a lot of places where we have the most variety of raptor species are places that lack a lot of scientific research.

So we have a conservation grant for raptors, and it helps scientists on the ground in Asia, Africa, and South America conserve these species and study them.

- And tell us about the event coming up.

You've got a keynote and you've got some field trips we don't wanna miss.

- We do.

Actually, it's more than just a single event.

It's kind of a whole week of programs and offerings.

Wings Across the World is really focusing on Dr. Megan Murgatroyd.

She's our director of international programs.

She's based in South Africa, so she's gonna talk about the work she's doing there and also share what some of these grant awardees have been doing across the world to protect raptors.

Oh, goodness.

- Oh, she wants to go, and tell us about the field trips for- - Yeah, so the field trips are to see some of the local raptors we have.

We have a lot of great projects that we do run here locally.

So burrowing owls, peregrine falcons, nesting raptors.

So people can get involved, even if they can't come to the event itself, they can join a field trip and learn more about our local birds.

- Wonderful.

I'm so glad you came and that you brought her.

Beautiful.

Thank you.

- Oh, she's great.

Happy to be here.

- And if you'd like to know more about those upcoming events with the HawkWatch International, Wings Across the World, June 13th at 6:30 will be the speech in Monarch, Ogden.

And then you can also sign up for field trips to see some of the local raptors.

Just go to hawkwatch.org.

That's hawkwatch.org.

I'm Mary Dickson, thanks for watching "Contact".

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