Midwest winters are changing. So is the ancient sport of falconry [Video]

By Melina Walling The Associated Press

GREENLEAF, Wis. (AP) — Stephanie Stevens has a good reason to love the bone-numbing cold of a Wisconsin winter. Every weekend, she loads up her minivan with a large green box and drives out to rural areas, usually the edges of friends’ farm fields.

After she slips on a thick leather glove, out of the box and onto her wrist hops her unconventional hunting buddy, Alexie Echo-Hawk, Echo for short: a juvenile red-tailed hawk.