As various types and sizes of birds were brought out of their cages, each drew “ooos” and “aahs” from the students and staff members gathered in the gymnasium.

Brad Skinner and Jenna Penland from the American Eagle Foundation in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, spent last week visiting Emerson and Margaret R. Brown Elementary schools in Seymour and schools in Lawrence, Jennings, Scott, Clark and Floyd counties.

The programs were made possible through a grant from the Duke Energy Foundation so students could learn about birds of prey and why it’s important to protect them.

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“We have a lot of birds of prey around our power plants, and we do an awful lot of work to protect those birds of prey because they provide a very important function to the environment,” Duke representative Chip Orben said.

The American Eagle Foundation is a nonprofit organization that takes care of about 60 birds of prey. They are all nonreleasable, which means they started out in the wild but were injured or hand-raised and couldn’t survive on their own.

The first bird in the program was a red-tailed hawk, which is the most common species of hawk in the eastern United States, Penland said. They often are found sitting on power lines, tree branches and fence posts near pastures or fields and have excellent eyesight to spot their favorite foods, including mice, rats, rabbits and squirrels.

The red-tailed hawk featured in the program fell out of its nest as a baby and was attacked by a predator. It was then taken to a rehabilitation center and became used to being around people and forgot he was a hawk, Penland said. That’s referred to as an imprinted bird.

“If he was released into the wild, he would have no idea what to do. He would probably look for the nearest person and look for food. He doesn’t know how to hunt for food himself,” Penland said. “That’s why it’s very important if you ever find a bird of prey or an injured bird of prey on the ground, take it to your local vet or rehabber so it can get the proper care it needs so it doesn’t grow up thinking it’s a person.”

Next up was a Harris’s hawk named Mikey. They mostly are found in deserts in southwestern states and are called wolves of the sky because they hunt in packs. Skinner said it’s common to see several of them land on each other’s back and look in different directions for food to eat.

Mikey was raised by a pair of golden eagles, so he thinks he is an eagle, Skinner said. He is retired from the Wings of America bird show that the foundation puts on at Dollywood in Pigeon Forge.

Before Penland brought out the next bird, she asked the students what they think is the fastest animal. Most said cheetah. While cheetahs can run at about 70 mph, peregrine falcons are one of the fastest animals in the world because they can dive up to 270 mph, she said.

They have long pointed wings, a long tail and spiraled nostrils so they can breathe while diving at a fast speed.

In the 1960s and 1970s, peregrine falcons nearly became extinct because the chemical DET was sprayed on crop fields to kill insects. If the falcons ate those insects and later laid eggs, the eggshells were thin and were accidentally crushed.

At one point, Penland said there were less than 200 peregrine falcons in the wild in the United States.

“Thankfully, humans recognized that error, and now, the peregrine falcon is thriving,” she said. “We banned DET. We don’t use it anymore, and you can actually find peregrine falcons living in cities. They’ve adapted very, very well to living around people, and they are becoming more and more common every day.”

Skinner then talked about another type of falcon, the American kestrel. They can dive about 70 mph while hunting for insects, birds and mice.

“They love mice more than anything,” he said. “They are one of the best pest controls that you can ever have at your own home.”

Next was a turkey vulture named George, who turns 34 this year. While some people think they are ugly, nasty and spread disease because they eat pretty much anything that’s dead, Penland said they have a very important job.

“They are ingesting a lot of bacteria. They are ingesting a lot of gross things,” she said. “They have very strong stomach acids, so the stomach acid of a vulture can actually neutralize diseases that are harmful to humans, such as anthrax and botulism and even rabies. They serve a very important role in our environment by taking those diseases and removing them from the environment.”

One downfall is 16 of the 23 species of vultures in the world are endangered, threatened or vulnerable to extinction, Penland said.

“They are the most threatened bird of prey in the world, and we could possibly lose 50 percent of all of the vultures in the world within the next 25 years or so,” she said.

The smallest bird in the show was the eastern screech owl. Skinner said the nocturnal birds go after rodents.

The owl in the show was hit by a car as he was near trash thrown along a road, so Skinner encouraged people to put trash in the proper receptacles.

“We want to keep the environment safe for everybody and for birds of prey,” he said.

The show ended with the “star pupil,” a bald eagle named Challenger. The American Eagle Foundation started 30 years ago to save and protect bald eagles from extinction, Penland said.

Challenger has been living at the foundation for nearly 30 years. He fell out of his nest during a storm as a baby and was hand-raised by people until he was old enough to be released in the wild.

A few weeks later, he started landing near people begging for food and became an imprinted bird.

“He thinks that he is a person because people always fed him when he was a baby,” Penland said. “He thinks people are always going to feed him, and he doesn’t understand how to hunt for himself.”

Most bald eagles live near large rivers, lakes and oceans to hunt for their favorite food, fish. They mate for life and are monogamous, and they come back to the same nest every year and add on to it, some weighing more than 1,000 pounds, Penland said.

In the 1970s, bald eagles also almost became extinct because of DET. They were removed from the endangered species list in 2007 but still are a protected species.

“Even though it seems they kind of turned that critical corner — they are no longer endangered — it’s up to each and every one of us to protect this bird to secure the future for it,” Penland said.

Challenger is one of the nearly 30 bald eagles cared for by the American Eagle Foundation and has done several flyovers at NFL games and other sporting events.

Emerson first-grader Kento Nakamura said Challenger was his favorite bird, while classmates Cooper Tormoehlen and Lauryn Green liked the turkey vulture.

“Because he looks funny,” Tormoehlen said.

“I learned about how they are an important part of our environment,” Green said.

Penland encourages people to do what they can to protect birds of prey.

“We’re hoping that you’ll remember this for the rest of your life and you’ll grow to love birds of prey just as much as Brad and I do,” she said.