Despite uncooperative weather, last week was amazingly productive. Only two new intakes for the week, but LWR now has a raptor flight pen almost ready for  occupation!

Remember Cody Rogers, the Georgia Southern engineering senior who coordinated the group of volunteers in January who got the songbird flight pen up? He and a friend from his hometown, Tyson Krantz, my nephew Alex and his friend Aaron Baeumel busted their butts yesterday and got the raptor flight almost completely done. These hardworking young men continued by four-wheeler headlights after dark to get the last of the slats up, so that all we have left is the latticework roof, the hardware cloth on the top, sides and interior floor, and the door and roofing tin.

I don’t even know where to begin expressing my gratitude to Cody, Tyson, Alex and Aaron. I have, however, promised to name the first downy raptor intake of the year in Cody’s honor, as he coordinated both construction efforts and made these flight pens happen!

Alex and I finished with the hardware cloth predator guard in the songbird flight, so now we just need to get the door up on it.

The poor screech is still glaring at me from his nest box;  rain early last week and then frigid (for Georgia) temps thwarted his planned release. Toward the middle of this week, the weather’s actually supposed to be nice for several consecutive days, so fingers crossed we can get the peeved little fellow out then. Meanwhile, this is pretty much all I see of him:

This female house finch came in with a very advanced case of “finch eye”, or mycoplasmic conjunctivitis. It’s a highly contagious avian disease most often seen in birds who frequent feeders that aren’t cleaned regularly. In its early stages it’s treatable but by the time this poor girl came in, it was too late. I didn’t even have to euthanize; she died shortly after intake.

And finally, I love it when people work together for the benefit of an injured bird. Late Thursday, a UPS driver named Mike (didn’t get his last name) called and said he’d found a hawk by the side of the road. His route was nowhere near LWR, but he did have customer on his route he thought might be willing to meet me in Dublin with the bird. He said he’d ask her when he delivered her package and have her call me if she was willing to transport the hawk. Less than 10 minutes later Michelle called me and quite cheerfully agreed to bring me the hawk. Way to go, Mike and Michelle!

The hawk, an adult male red shoulder, had a massive concussion but surprisingly—and happily—no broken bones. He had a bit of a head tic to the right and was unable to stand, sitting back on his hocks with his feet balled. I gave him meds for pain and left him alone until the next morning.

Friday he was standing with his head tucked, so aside from medicating again and offering him a low perch, I just let him rest. Saturday—head still tucked most of the time; still no interest in food. It’s not unusual for a concussed raptor to refuse food for 24-48 hours, so I didn’t stress this guy out with force feeding.

Today he’s mostly kept his head untucked and is more alert, but now his head tic is more pronounced and to the left. He still won’t lower his head to pick up food, so I hand fed him earlier. He was resistant at first but pretty quickly decided he was hungry, as long as he didn’t have to lower that head!

We’ll be watching that head tic closely, as it indicates some sort of neurological issue. It may be just “fallout” from the concussion, or it may signal more serious problems. Right now,  I’m leaning toward lingering aftereffects of the concussion, but only time will tell.

No, not the screech yet; weather hasn’t been cooperative lately, but today’s looking good, so…aiming at a pre-dusk release for him today.

Today’s release was a little female house finch who’d been cat-attacked some two weeks ago and was kept in a cage by her rescuer until a few days ago. This was one more lucky bird in that the cat only ripped out some tail feathers, most of which were already back to near-full length by the time the finch made it to LWR. After a couple of days’ observation to ensure she was fully flighted, she was released.

Folks, please, PLEASE help spread the word that cat-attack victims need IMMEDIATE care from a licensed rehabber. Had this house finch been bitten or clawed by the cat, she would have died within 24-48 hours without treatment. Cats carry bacteria that is DEADLY to wildlife.

When any wildlife is found injured or ill, simply placing it in a cage and proclaiming your love of nature is not only illegal, it belies the very love you profess to have for wildlife. If you truly care, YOU WILL SEEK HELP for that critter.

This has to be the least-favorite expression a rehabber hears on an all-too-frequent basis: “Oh, I just love animals (or some variation thereof); once I…” followed by some tale of illegal activity that usually didn’t end well for the wildlife.

That’s not loving wildlife; that’s ego, plain and simple: “Look at me and how wonderful I am…” Well, let me explain how wonderful you’re NOT: when someone with no experience or whose only experience has been with domestic animals—or even another rehabber who’s not licensed for the species—attempts to care for a species they know little or nothing about, IT IS THE WILDLIFE THAT SUFFERS. Do you understand that? IGNORANCE KILLS.

Oh, sure, sometimes—as in the case of this finch—the wildlife is lucky and healthy enough that well-meaning but ill-advised attempts to care for it do no lasting harm. The sad fact is, however, that the vast majority of the time, wildlife “cared for” by untrained individuals suffers from lack of proper diet, lack of proper housing, lack of proper environment and massive amounts of stress from being used as “show and tell” for all the friends and neighbors.

You’d be surprised how many people have no clue that possession of wildlife without permits is illegal; you’d be shocked at how many people know and just don’t care—and will point-blank tell anyone who will listen that they’re gonna continue to do whatever they damn well please and dare the authorities to do anything about it. The sad fact is, neither state nor federal authorities have the manpower to go after these scofflaws, so they do in fact get away with murder, quite literally.

How can you help? Spread the word that for people who truly care about wildlife, there is an option when they find injured, orphaned or ill wildlife: their local rehabber(s). For those who’ve made it clear they just don’t care, social pressure is a wonderful thing. Enlist others to help make them feel like the scum they are. When they’re no longer getting their egos stroked for their illegal activities, they’ll wise up and do the right thing—or maybe by that point there will be enough evidence that the authorities can make a case against them.

Okay, off the soapbox for now…

This adult male barred owl wasn’t as lucky as the finch. He was turned into an animal hospital several counties away after he crashed into a church window. Unfortunately, his neck was broken. He was still alive and could extend his wings and flex his and feet, but his head lolled at an ungodly angle and he had no control over it, and he couldn’t stand up, not even when propped in the corner of his box. On the off chance that the anti-inflammatory the vets at that clinic gave him might kick in and do some good, he was given an additional 24 hours after intake at LWR, but it wasn’t gonna happen. He was euthanized 24 hours after intake.

And we’re down to the final touches on the songbird flight, with my nephew Alex helping me get most of the hardware cloth predator guard down today—we ran out of hardware cloth and are waiting on the store to get more in (yeah, wiped out their in-store stock…). We’ll finish that and get the door up during the coming week. After that, it will be all “interior decorating” with perches, water dishes and such!

Oh Lordy, let’s just start with the good news: the screech from last week’s aborted release is doing fine, feelin’ his oats, and may even be ready for a second attempt at release this week. Fingers crossed!

And despite a conspiracy (paranoid? Me? After this past week, yeah, a wee bit!) between the weather, my crashed hard drive (knew it was coming; had all the important stuff backed up), and a subsequent massive editing workload to catch up on, we still managed to get the mesh up in the flight pen, thanks to my nephew and niece-in-law, Alex and Brooke. Our plans were to get the hardware cloth on the floor and the door up, as well, but—well, see above: conspiracy and all…

However, the remainder of the week’s events were…less than stellar for the birds concerned.

Upon intake, I suspected this little white-throated sparrow was a window-strike victim. He exhibited the skewed tail and inability to use his legs that frequently typifies window strikes. More concerning, though, was his labored breathing, which I was afraid indicated “blown” lungs, i.e., he’d hit the window so hard it ruptured his lungs.  Still, he was alert and did at least attempt to eat, so I started antibiotics and anti-inflammatories and hoped…

He died during the night.

Two days later, a caller said she had a “baby brown thrasher, just learning to fly” that she’d found covered with oil-based paint. Of course, it’s nowhere near baby season, so I was pretty sure we didn’t have a brown thrasher on the way. I told the caller to wrap the bird in paper towels so he couldn’t ingest the paint and not to do anything else.

Upon intake, the bird—an adult Carolina wren, covered with white latex paint—was unrestrained on a “bed” of paper towels in a plastic container…covered with a paint-soaked rag. The finder also said she’d put Vaseline on the wren. So much for following instructions…

This poor bird was a disaster. I honestly didn’t hold out much hope that the paint was going to come off, as it was caked on his little body and head, but I gritted my teeth and tried. The thing is, Carolina wrens—as you may recall—are notoriously stressy little birds. I love ‘em dearly, but they epitomize stressy. And adding to my worry, when I cleaned off the little guy’s beak and he opened it, there was paint all in his mouth. Probably shoulda called it at that point; he’d obviously ingested the paint…but he was still alert and active, the poor little fellow…

So I washed and gently rubbed feathers between my fingers and rinsed and…well, we had to take frequent short breaks to allow the Caro a little de-stressing time…And I honestly thought we made pretty good progress, all things considered. This wasn’t gonna be a one-day “clean and we’re done” deal; it was gonna take several days of washing and rubbing and rinsing.

He was in fairly good shape by lights-out; the pretty brown and black barring on his wings and back was visible again. I was hopeful but not optimistic that he might survive the night, but less than two hours later he had died…

Here’s hoping this week has better outcomes for our wildlife…

Remember our attitudinal little male screech owl from last week, with his threats and posturing? Since his eye had cleared up beautifully, the plan was to release him Monday. And then both Monday and Tuesday, we had really high winds, and as a general rule, I don’t release on windy days.

So…release delayed a couple of days. No problem; he was eating well and I moved him into a bigger indoor pen so he could move around more while we waited for the weather to cooperate.

Then it rained. *sigh* Release delayed again…

Finally, toward the end of the week, the weather cooperated and I hied Sir Attitude hence to release him near where he was found.

Take him out of the box, hold him for one last photo op before release…

…and release my grip on his feet. And wait. And wait. And…well, see for yourself in the video below.

The reason it ends so abruptly is that when Sir Screech decided to gather his little body and take off, he coasted right to the ground and took off running, eventually wedging himself under a half-rotten log. I had to chase him through the woods and pry him out from under the log—and bring him back to LWR for a while longer.

I’ve consulted with Steve Hicks of Bubba & Friends raptor rehab, who says he can’t remember ever seeing a screech do this. We’re thinking there’s some sort of neurological issue here, although Steve did suggest, tongue-in-cheek, that perhaps I’d been feeding the little guy too well and he was just plain too fat to fly. Believe it or not, that really can be an issue for birds in rehab, but this screech hadn’t been with me long enough to pack on that kind of weight.

Meanwhile, on the flight pen front, two more Georgia Southern students helped my nephew Alex, my father and me put up the roofing tin and most of the outside hardware cloth yesterday. Junior Jessica Emery of Brunswick, GA is a mechanical engineering major and a member of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society and freshman Richard Rising of Atlanta is also a mechanical engineering major.

This afternoon my nephew Alex and niece-in-law Brooke helped finish the last outside hardware cloth and put up a bit of flashing, suggested by my father. We’ve got the inside mesh to go--and the door, of course. By next weekend, weather cooperating, this flight should be ready for use!

And Cody Rogers, who spearheaded last week’s GSU volunteers, is already recruiting another group to return later this month to get the raptor pen up, as well. To show my gratitude, I’ve promised to name the first downy raptor of the year in his honor!