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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 18, 1979)
the Battalion THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1979 Page 3 campus irds’ future questioned 14: F fascinatiii(| V’oneim es who «iij 'ses forfe By MARJORIE McLAUGHLIN Battalion Reporter iBirds of prey are facing an uncer- jjn future because of man’s misun- Irstanding of their role in nature, Jlid bird authority John Karger fltiesday. Karger’s presentation was onsored by the Wildlife Biology Isociation. Karger, who specializes in bird rehabilitation, said most people coo ler birds of prey as chicken and ep killers that should be extermi- jted, despite the work that they do | scavengers. ses wereoM| The hawk is here to clean up the iters w! jyorld,” Karger said. “It gets damned doing its job.” ool, f One of Karger’s “patients,” a red- ion is tool ght by ide enlij programs, e r, but don’t lly workti y. Othei i. graduals who whet ;aritbms,i :ed, man. tailed hawk, attended the speech perched on an assistant’s arm. The hawk, missing an eye and three toes, was injured in a shooting incident. Karger also brought a black vul ture, which hopped out into the au dience. “Vultures are good targets to shoot at,” Karger said, “but they are the garbagemen of the earth. You wouldn’t shoot your garbageman would you?” At least 80 percent of all young birds of prey are killed, 40 percent of them by man, said Karger. In the wild, the birds rarely live five years. Karger, who has worked with birds since he was nine, treats 85-125 injured birds a year, spending two to three hours daily with each of them. He receives the birds from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and from individuals who find them. Working with veterinarians who treat the birds, Karger’s job is re habilitation. Different techniques are used for the various birds that he works with, he said. Less severely injured birds are placed into a large wooden box with slatted sides, allowing some flight. The birds are fed through a small window and do not have contact with humans. As soon as they are healed, they are released. “We don’t release a bird until we are sure that it can provide for itself and won’t come back to man,” Karger said. Birds requiring a longer recovery time are trained to perch on Karger’s arm, to accept food and, eventually, to fly again. When the bird is fully healed, its contact time with men is shortened until it is ready to go back to the wild. Karger finances his work by giving speeches about problems birds and other wildlife face in today’s world. He is presently working at the Texas Renaissance Festival in Mag nolia, giving falconry demon strations and speeches about the fate of the birds he said he loves. “It is like we’re living on a big wheel with each spoke being a part of life,” he said. “If we continue to knock out the spokes, how long be fore the wheel collapses?” eircV mime troup delights all graduatei By KATHLEEN McELROY Battalion Reporter f anyone in the audience of the Mummenschanz performance in Rudder Auditorium Wednesday night expected the usual mime outines of man-waiting-for-a-bus, or jy-meets-girl, he might have been appointed. But probably that person would been laughing too hard hmghout the show to notice the Review Sference. Everyone — the old, the young, and the college student — ^med to enjoy the show even if he didn’t understand it. ■Mummenschanz, which in Ger- Dan means “games of chance, ” is in- ed a mime group. But the three- mtmber group doesn’t act out everyday situations — they turn completely unrealistic things and concepts into man’s emotions. For istance, the first act of the show mimes the evolution of man, and such an attempt is no small feat, r The act started with a gray clump sitting on the modest set, a small platform with a ramp on either side. At first most people in the near capacity crowd were trying to decide what that “thing” was, but soon they gave up and just enjoyed its rolling and jumping struggle to the top of the platform. The sequence of the gray clump was like most of the other scenes in the performance. It was short — three to five minutes — and alter nately funny and sad. Though the object looked totally inanimate, it expressed feelings of excitement, disappointment and even tiredness by just rolling around the set. The funniest scene of the first act, and in fact the whole show, involved a game of catch with the audience and someone (or something) dressed like a collapsible straw with a big balloon ball. The “thing” played catch by tossing the ball into the crowd. It cheered a good throw and ridiculed bad throws. Mummenschanz will probably be one of the few OPAS performers to give a “halftime show. ” Two troupers performed in the auditorium while the third clowned with the audience in the lobby. ' Dressed in black, as they were through the show, they had boxes for heads. Throughout, emotions flowed from them to the crowd. (It’s funny to see a box salute to a cadet or to watch a female box cover itself in masking tape.) The second act has even more fan tasy concepts than the first, and is geared more for adults. It contains the well known toilet tissue se quence — a case of male tissue (yel low in color) falling in love with female tissue (pink). The tissue is used for hair for the female, tears for the male, and flowers for both. Mummenschanz has performed more than 1,000 times on Broadway and has made several television ap pearances — and after seeing it, it’s easy to see why. It is a talented group that expresses deep emotions with weird props, or no props at all. But to truly appreciate the beauty of Mummenschanz you have to see it in person. * * * ★ * * 4c 4c 4c 4c 4c 4c 4c 4c I 4c SHALA’S SHOES “Your Fashion Shoe Store” GREAT LOOKS FOR FALL Amelia by Nina With This Coupon, get J5% off any purchase Thurs. thru Sat. black suede Shala's Shoes Across From Campus 707 Texas ★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★ BOOK Store New drug is tested for glaucoma victims 1 Medical researchers have launched human testing of a new drug for glaucoma, an ailment that has partially or totally blinded over 250,000 Americans. DMC, or demethylated car- chol, may improve treatment for illions of glaucoma victims by re ccing or eliminating side effects, id Dr. George C. Y. Chiou, head of ^Pharmacology in the Texas A&M ill ||iniversity College of Medicine. ^ F Eye irritation and pupil contrac tion are side effects of treatment with ,,a V pilocarpine, presently the most i / widely used drug for fighting 1 sha Hlaucoma, said Chiou. iersw E Chiou and Dr. Thom Zimmerman "r Hf Louisiana State University’s Eye people can develop the ailment as young as age 20. It is caused by a buildup of pressure in the chambers of the eye. Untreated, the pressure deadens the optic nerve head and causes blindness. About 178,000 new cases of glaucoma are reported in the United States yearly and disease has already blinded 56,000 Americans and im paired the vision of 200,000 more. noithqate thur 10/18 friday 710/19 Saturday 10/20 i m €»■ open til 7pm 52Ziiniyersim drive own f few y Renter are testing DMC on 10 vol- isarri'i Unteers t j iere as p ar j G f the long- ie faro'r- erm cooperative study. I A report on the months-long study ; Post will be prepared for the Food and |rug Administration, which will de- iide if the drug warrants further test- 1* ng in hospitals. If successful at that |A * a § e ’ DMC could be approved for commercial marketing. Chiou said another phase of the Texas A&M-LSU study will be to ex- lore a combined dosage of DMC d timolol, a glaucoma drug already the market. It could be that a combined dosage of the two — which work in a differ- lit way — could reduce side effects vvliole-t oven more because of the smaller en( || amount of each drug used, on the' * Glaucoma is primarily a disease of , is the?* S 61-50115 over age 40, the Texas A&M ’gjounctoUsdical researcher noted, but not aj 1 JVC SIMPLE BUT SUPERB SALE ■ a ntl or eve» : Twelfth jt see® 1 1 them f s less 7vp?n»m&* RS-7 RECEIVER 50 watts per channel .03% Total Harmonic Distortion I KD-10 CASSETTE DECK 30-16,000 KHz .06% wow a flutter Cronios Head Eddie Dominguez 66 Joe Arciniega 74 ONLY *240 RS-5RECEIVER 25 watts per channel .03% Total Harmonic Distortion ONLY *179 QL-A5 TURNTABLE Semi-automatic Quartz-locked Super Servo .015% wow & flutter 75 OB S/N RANG ONLY $ 179 00 LA-II TURNTABLE Semi Automatic Belt Drive .06% wow & flutter ONLY $ 179 KD-A1 CASSETTE DECK 30-16,000 KHz .08% wow a flutter Cronios Head .U6% wow & flutter ONLY *84 00 ONLY *1 59 FINANCING AVAILABLE AUDIO 707 Texas Ave. in College Station 696-5719