Red-tailed hawk ruffles feathers inside New Jersey library

TOMS RIVER, N.J. — There’s this thing with feathers in a New Jersey library.

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A red-tailed hawk, boasting a 4-foot wingspan, has been perched inside the Ocean City Library since Monday, NJ.com reported. Officials said the bird is in no hurry to leave.

“We were waiting to see if he would just come out on its own. As of right now, he’s healthy and up there walking around,” library spokesperson Sherri Taliercio said Wednesday. “It’s a large male bird. We’re hoping he comes out soon.”

According to a Facebook post on Monday, library officials said the facility, located in Toms River, would be closed for the rest of the day “for maintenance.”

The bird had still not flown the coop two days later.

“An avian care specialist is helping the library safely capture and remove the hawk,” library officials wrote on Facebook.

This red-tailed hawk is approximately 20 to 22 inches tall, Taliercio told NJ.com. She said it flew into the library and sat on a window sill. At first, the library was closed out of caution but reopened Tuesday, according to the website.

“We don’t know how it got in here. Our only assumption is that, (because) it is a very large bird, it stepped where the automatic doors are and flew in that way,” Taliercio said. “Somehow he got up in the ceiling, in the ceiling tiles, and that is currently where he is. We have a camera on the one section, just to make sure he’s safe.”

Library patrons need not worry. The bird of prey usually feasts on rodents and small mammals. Library officials said the red-tailed hawk has not bothered any visitors or workers in the building, officials said.

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