Feathered Cocaine

The sport of falconry has been practiced for 4,000 years. But in the last two decades, a huge increase in demand for the birds as hunting companions in the Middle East has resulted in regional extinctions. The aptly-named Alan H. Parrot runs a nature conservation group that fights international falcon smuggling cartels. Parrot's obsession with falcons led him at age 18 to sneak away from home to Iran, where he was hired to train falcons for the Shah. Though he was the first person to legally sell the birds in centuries, Parrot now realizes his actions opened a Pandora's Box of problems. Magnificent Arctic gyrfalcons, stuffed into mailing tubes and sent to the Persian Gulf, can bring unprincipled traders over a million dollars. A fearless crusader for the falcons' well-being, Parrot was once left for dead in the Mongolian desert after exposing smuggling by the Mongolian authorities. His new mission, as described in FEATHERED COCAINE, is to go after terrorists in their capacity as falcon smugglers. Parrot and others are convinced it's possible to track down Osama bin-Laden by monitoring the frequencies of the telemetry transmitters carried by his falcons. Why isn't our government paying attention? –B.B.