With wedding hawk and pigeons, Md. man lives a life for the birds

So he accepted as many bookings as he could and quit his other jobs. “By the second year I knew it was going to be huge,” he says. “It would take over everything.”

And for a while it did.

Gallery

Wedding theme ideas: Selecting a theme — such as Victorian or rustic — can help narrow down flower and color choices, and ensure all decor is cohesive.

Graphic

So you just got engaged and the reality of planning the event is starting to sink in. With the aid of a few planning professionals, we’ve mapped out a timeline to keep you on target and prepared for the big day.

But after Sept. 11, 2001, business dropped off precipitously. Wedding doves began to seem like a luxury and bookings slowed to 40 percent of what they once were. “We’re like the last vendor,” he says of his wedding clients. “They need a limousine. They need a photographer. They don’t need birds.”

Three years ago, Vitilio began to think about how to bolster his business. For 17 years he’d had a Harris hawk with a remarkably gentle disposition. A fellow falconer had given Vitilio the hawk when it was two years old because he couldn’t get the bird to hunt. Vitilio says that after two weeks with him, the hawk caught his first rabbit.

The hawk became a great hunter, but Vitilio was almost more impressed by its way with people. The bird, which he calls Harris, let kids touch his reddish feathers and would fly to anyone.

“If you have a glove on and have a treat, it will be there in two seconds. And he’s a small enough bird that he’s not overpowering so he scares people,” Vitilio says. “But he’s cool enough that when it happens they’re like, ‘Whoa!’ ”

Vitilio had already been using the bird at exhibitions and community events, so in 2009 he offered it for weddings. “And it just went crazy,” he says.

Vitilio worked up some theatrics around the hawk, having the best man pat down his pockets and look frantic when the wedding officiant asks for the rings. Then he’ll slip on a leather glove and Vitilio will cue the hawk to fly from the back and land on the best man’s arm with the rings attached to a pouch. Most often Harris is requested as a showstopper for guests, although sometimes he’s also a surprise for the bride or groom.

After the ceremony, Vitilio will stick around and let others slip on the glove and hold the bird for photos.

Already the hawk is booked on most weekends from spring to fall of 2013 and into the following year.

Often, Vitilio says, grooms get dragged to wedding shows and wander around the cakes and dresses, looking bored until they see his hawk. “They’ll say, ‘Honey, I love ya. I don’t care if you have purple shoes and a green limousine — I want that hawk.’ ”