A Hoot of a Ceremony

Local author Melissa Hart remembers her wedding at Cascades Raptor Center

Author Melissa Hart and husband Jonathan release a red-tailed hawk at their nuptials.

“Jonathan? Melissa? Meet us on the lawn and close your eyes.” Grinning staff members at the Cascades Raptor Center led us past our lopsided wedding cake to the grass outside the visitors’ center. “We have a gift for you … don’t peek.” For years, we’d volunteered to clean mews, feed orphaned owls and medicate injured hawks at the nature center and wildlife hospital in Eugene. After Jonathan proposed, we asked to marry at the center.  Continue reading