Wildlife rehab is unpredictable; one week may be insanely busy with new intakes, and the next week you’re taking care of only those “pending” cases awaiting release. Of course, during baby season, all bets are off; there are NO slow weeks. This, however, was one of the slower weeks, with no new intakes and only 13 pendings to care for.
Beginning with last week’s two birds awaiting vet visits, the barred owl with the cloudy eye had no fractures; the right wing I was worried about showed clear on x-rays. He’s antsy, and I don’t think the eye will cause any long-term problems for him, so he’s slated for release next week.
Beginning with last week’s two birds awaiting vet visits, the barred owl with the cloudy eye had no fractures; the right wing I was worried about showed clear on x-rays. He’s antsy, and I don’t think the eye will cause any long-term problems for him, so he’s slated for release next week.
The young red-tail wasn’t as lucky, however. His x-rays revealed a nasty, unfixable fracture right at the elbow, and it’d already started forming a callus, so he’d been down a while—which would explain his extreme thinness and eager devouring of his food. Sometimes the only consolation is that the bird didn’t die hungry…
One screech left like she was launched from a rocket, with no time for video or photos; the other—well, see for yourself:
After 10 minutes of this nonsense, I gave up and he came back home with me, where he awaits another release attempt next week. Rotten rascal…
The barred owl, red-tail, red shoulder and crow continue to recuperate nicely and are all due for follow-up vet visits shortly to see how things stand.
The kestrel is still not in the raptor flight. Kestrels don’t handle cold weather well, and it was just too chilly this week to risk it. Next week’s temps look promising for him to finally get his flight time, though.
And the flyers have pretty much stayed holed up in their cozy nest box this week, at least until after lights-out.
Now for some interesting stats for you, compiled while I was finishing my federal annual report near the end of January (still working on state; it’s more detailed):
- The top two raptor species LWR saw in 2017 were—surprise on this one, right?—barred owls (37) and red shouldered hawks (20).
- The top two songbird species we saw—and neither of these should be surprising—were Carolina wrens (26) and mockingbirds (19).
- LWR saw 13 raptor species, 36 songbird species, and 5 waterfowl species in 2017. These, along with the flyers, totaled 312 intakes for the year.
- Of the people who brought wildlife to LWR in 2017, only 23 donated toward their care—that’s just 7%.
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