…Which, with baby season looming large on the horizon, I’m not complaining about a bit. LWR received several calls that didn’t result in intakes, so there were actually no new intakes this week. Weird…
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That leaves us with the gray squirrels, who continue to develop as they should. Both have open eyes now, even though the pictorial evidence doesn’t  fully support this. For the first couple of weeks after their eyes open, nothing really changes: they wake up long enough to eat and then crash till the next feeding. When they begin staying awake and nibbling on solids, they can go into a larger pen with room to move and climb, beginning the process of readying them for their eventual release at 12 weeks.

​The red-tailed hawk’s left eye looks great and as of today, he’s stopped tilting his head as if he can’t see out of it. I still think his vision might be a bit off in that eye, and it looks as if it still has some blood in it, but overall, it looks 100% better than it did on intake.

​His wing is still an unknown factor. He’ll go back in this week for x-rays to see to what extent, if any, we have healing going on.  Keep your fingers crossed for this gorgeous fellow; he needs to be back in the wild.

​With baby season on the horizon—I interrupted a Carolina wren’s nest-making today when I entered the tool shed without warning—here are some tips to keep in mind to make your property a safe haven for nesting birds:

1. First and most importantly, AVOID THE USE OF PESTICIDES/INSECTICIDES.  These poisons kill indiscriminately, taking out the beneficial as well as the harmful insects and “weeds” (for the record, dandelions are NOT weeds; they’re extremely beneficial to wildlife) and killing both adult and baby birds, either from eating poisoned insects or ingesting the poisons when they groom them off their feathers.
2. Just as importantly, KEEP YOUR CATS INDOORS. Cats will climb trees to prey on weak, helpless nestling birds and they will pounce with alacrity on newly-fledged, poorly-flighted birds. It IS possible to love both cats and birds; just be a responsible cat owner and keep your moggies inside and away from the local bird population.
3. LOOK CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU TRIM TREES/LIMBS. Some nests are fairly obvious; cavity nests such as woodpeckers and bluebirds use are not. And a hummingbird nest is so tiny as to be almost invisible unless you look really hard. And don’t rely on the observations of tree trimming services; they’re there to make money. If they don’t trim, they don’t get paid, so they’re not gonna look too hard for nests.
4. LEAVE A FEW BRUSH PILES IN THE BACK CORNERS OF YOUR YARD. These are great for newly fledged birds to take refuge in.
5. Likewise, LEAVE THOSE SNAGS (DEAD TREES) ALONE. Their soft wood is perfect for cavity nesters like woodpeckers and bluebirds.
6. CHECK YOUR YARD/FIELD CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU MOW. Various birds, like common ground doves and bobwhite quail (which are listed as near-threatened status because of their declining numbers), are ground nesters and may have nests in the grass. Even if you don’t have ground nesters, there may be fledglings or unnested babies in the yard/field.
7. If you find unnested babies, DON’T PANIC. Unless they’re injured or in immediate danger—covered with ants or about to become a predator’s snack, for example—leave them where they are and observe from a safe distance, to allow the parents to feel safe coming to their baby, for about 30-45 minutes. If you see no signs of the parents and cannot locate the nest (or if the nest is out of reach) to re-nest the babies, THEN call your local federally licensed bird rehabber ASAP.
8.  If you find that you must call your local bird rehabber, DON’T GIVE THOSE BABIES FOOD OR WATER UNLESS DIRECTED TO DO SO BY THE REHABBER. The wrong foods can kill baby birds very quickly, and it’s very easy for both food and water to enter their lungs and literally drown them. It’s called aspiration and if the bird is lucky it’ll just end up with aspiration pneumonia; if it’s not so lucky it will quite literally drown from the fluids you’ve sent into the lungs in an ill-guided attempt to  help the bird. Bread or bread and milk is NEVER an appropriate food, and not all birds feed their young worms.
9. FLEDGLINGS—YOUNG BIRDS JUST OUT OF THE NEST AND STILL LEARNING TO FLY—GENERALLY DO NOT REQUIRE INTERVENTION. They will be fully feathered with very short tail feathers. They’re also poor flyers at this point, but their parents are feeding them and encouraging them to move to higher and safer ground. Only intervene with a fledgling if you see that it is injured, in danger from a predator or if after 30-45 minutes of observation from a safe distance you see no parents feeding it.
10. OFFER A VARIETY OF VERY SHALLOW WATER DISHES, IDEALLY NEAR LOW-HANGING LIMBS/PERCHES. Birds love to drink and bathe, but smallish, shallow dishes with a few rocks in the bottom will ensure that no fledglings accidentally drown in your water dishes. Wet birds aren't good flyers so make sure there are easily accessible low limbs/perches near your water dishes.

Feel free to share these tips; people who are better informed are better “bird neighbors.”

The barred owl was released last week, much to our mutual delight. He was really going stir-crazy in the raptor flight, but between the colder than usual temps and the really windy conditions, he ended up staying a few days longer than either of us wanted. He was ready to go; I knew he was ready to go—so as soon as the weather cooperated, go he did!
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No video of the release because he shot out of the box and headed so deep into the woods that I couldn’t even locate him for an after-release photo. He did, however, hurl invectives at me as I opened the box for his release—THAT I did manage to catch on video!

​The gray squirrels continue to grow, and the female’s eyes opened this weekend. The male’s will probably open this week.

And early last week a first-year red-tailed hawk came in from a neighboring county. Their Animal Control had picked him up from the roadside over the weekend. His left eye looked pretty bad, and his right wing was broken and needed x-rays to determine the extent of the break.

Vets Richie Hatcher and Peggy Hobby of Smalley’s Animal Hospital felt the eye might be salvageable with treatment, so we agreed to give it time and meds to see what happened. It’s actually looking much better.
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This was the day after intake.

​And two days later.

​The wing, however, is going to be a bit iffier. While the break is mid-bone and not horribly displaced, it’s still in a location that may or may not heal properly. Given that he has held the wing perfectly level from the day of intake and the fact that he’ll be confined with little space to flail the wing wildly, Richie and I opted not to wrap it, as his personality led us to believe he’d do more damage trying to tear at the wrap than he would just leaving it “as-is”. Sometimes the best treatment is as little treatment as possible, and that’s what we’re banking on here.  He’ll go back in for further x-rays in a couple of weeks to see if a callus is starting to form around the fracture.  Fingers crossed we see some serious healing going on.

As I was coming off my own rehabber hell week two weeks ago, colleague Leslie Jackson of Oklahoma took in a red-tail whose knee was shattered and, of course, he required euthanasia. I think most raptor rehabbers have a soft spot for red-tails because they’re generally so laid-back in a rehab setting. Leslie made a statement that sums up how we feel many days: “The life of a Rehabber ain't all it's cracked up to be, folks.”

She’s absolutely right, which is why I grit my teeth and bite my tongue when people say, "Oh, what you do must be so much FUN." No. No, it's not fun. It's exhausting, emotionally draining, exasperating, and although there is exhilaration at releases, the "down" days far outweigh the "up" days. I don't do it for "fun"; I do it to compensate for human stupidity and apathy. It's my small way of making a difference.

It’s important to understand that in Nature’s eyes wildlife is effectively dead the moment humans can touch it, hence LWR’s catch-phrase—“Giving Nature’s children a second chance”.  Rehabbers offer that second chance to wildlife that otherwise would die of exposure, starvation, infection, injury—and sometimes the only “release” we can offer is an end to suffering.

This is why we get so frustrated with people who express an interest in becoming rehabbers but immediately follow their expression of interest with “But I could never put anything down.”

If you can’t euthanize and you can’t handle blood and gore, you’ll never be able to make it as a rehabber, people. Fully half an average rehabber’s intakes in any given year are either DOA or require euthanasia. It ain’t pleasant but it’s reality.

As for the other half, most of them stand a good chance at release—which brings up another least-favorite sentiment from the public: “Oh, I would get too attached and could never let anything go.”

I always wanna ask them, “So you’d keep wildlife captive in violation of state and, in the case of birds, federal law, knowing that you’re denying that wildlife the chance to live the life Nature intended for it?”

Folks, there is very little more rewarding than watching a bird or other wildlife that came in orphaned, ill or injured mature or regain its health and return to the wild where it belongs—releases are the lifeline for rehabbers; they’re what keep us going.

I don’t discourage anyone from becoming a rehabber but it’s important to know what you’re getting into so you don’t get burned out and bummed out after two or three years. It’s not a hobby; it’s a way of life, and if you can’t devote the time, money and energy to it and pour your heart and soul into doing what’s in the best interest of the wildlife, do us all a favor and don’t even explore the possibility. 

Last week was bookended by horrific situations that resulted in reports being filed with both Georgia DNR and US Fish & Wildlife.

Monday LWR received a red-tailed hawk via a volunteer transporter. This hawk had been taken in by a mammal rehabber in another county, who is NOT federally licensed for birds and has NO clue what she’s doing with them and who has been reported to DNR several times for taking and keeping federally protected birds without the proper permits. She then took this bird to a vet in that county who, while also a licensed rehabber, is also NOT licensed for or competent to deal with birds. She has a documented history of incompetence with raptors, in fact.

In the case of the red tail LWR eventually received, this incompetent vet, with NO x-rays or proper physical exam, told the mammal rehabber that the bird was “fine” and all she needed to do was “fatten it up” and let it go. Mammal rehabber decided, after the bird wouldn’t fly for her, that it needed to be in a flight pen first, but did she contact one of THREE licensed raptor rehabbers near her? Nope; that would mean admitting she’d had the bird illegally for nearly two weeks.

Instead, this poor bird spent almost a week with yet another mammal rehabber in another county, who is also not federally licensed and has openly bragged in the past that she’s not going to “get in trouble” for taking MBTA-protected birds and outright lied to a member of the public last year, telling them she had “all the permits” so she could take an injured raptor from them. This was reported as well, and where that poor bird ended up is anybody’s guess. Probably with the incompetent vet for non-treatment until it died. The current bird was sent by Mammal Rehabber 1 to Mammal Rehabber 2 because Mammal Rehabber 2 has a flight pen—now, I ask you, if you are NOT licensed for birds, why do you need a flight pen???

So all told, this particular hawk spent THREE WEEKS circulating among non-federally licensed individuals who knew they were in violation of both state and federal law AND incompetent to deal with the red tail but put boosting their own petty egos over the welfare of the bird.
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Upon taking the hawk to my vets within 90 minutes of intake, x-rays revealed fractures of the radius and ulna in the left wing. These fractures would have been cause for euthanasia three weeks earlier had the bird been in competent hands then. As it is, these three incompetents played “pass the raptor” for three weeks while he suffered from the pain of those fractures and then, when they tired of “playing raptor rehabber”, he was sent to LWR to end his suffering.  And the illegal activities of these people who should know better were immediately reported to the state and feds.

​Adding to the general crappiness of the week, late Friday night, LWR received a call from a concerned family whose sons had found an injured great horned owl grounded in the woods behind their house. Upon intake that night, it was clear the left leg was broken but, of course, required x-rays to determine the exact nature of the break. The left foot was unresponsive to stimuli, which didn’t bode well. The left pupil was extremely dilated and unresponsive. The wings seemed uninjured but breaks that aren’t badly displaced can sometimes be hard to feel. 

​Saturday morning, I took the owl to Smalley’s Animal Hospital, where x-rays revealed not only a leg fracture but also two fractures in the left wing—and lead pellets all through the body and head, including the left eye. Vet Richie Hatcher and I speculate someone shot the bird while it was in flight. Given the number of lead pellets, the impossibility of removing them all, the fractures in both left leg and wing, and the damage to the eye, we opted for euthanasia. We also noticed as the bird was going down that the inside of his beak was white—not pale, bone-white. This indicated to us that there was also internal bleeding, so even if we’d opted to attempt treatment, he would’ve bled out shortly.

​The couple whose sons who found the owl are outraged that anyone would shoot “their” owl, as they had been enjoying seeing it come up in the trees near their house for the past couple of months. They said they’d heard no gunshots in the past few days—nothing unusual. To their credit, the family who found the owl put their concern into further action by spending Saturday afternoon tramping through the woods looking for the nest, but they were unable to locate it.
 
This incident was also reported to the state and feds. The problem, however, is that without an actual eyewitness to the shooting, the chance of prosecution is nonexistent. 
 
And putting aside all attempts at professionalism, let me tell you right now that there’s a very special level of hell reserved for cretins like the one(s) who shot this owl—during great horned nesting season, no less, so yeah, there’s another nest of babies who likely won’t make it.
 
Normally I’d hop on a soapbox and rant a little more about these situations, but honestly, I’m still too infuriated to do more than spew profanity, and I try to keep this site family-friendly. So the bare-bones details will have to do.
 
Thankfully, there is good news from last week: the squirrels continue to develop nicely, and the female’s lower incisors came in so she is indeed about 10 days older than the male.

​Even better, the barred owl finally made it into the flight pen. He’s flying beautifully and will be released within the next few days if the weather cooperates.

​Not the best video ever—he popped out of the box like he was rocket-propelled and then just hung there on the side of the flight, glaring at me.
 
If you’ve not participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count yet, you still have today and tomorrow. Details are at http://gbbc.birdcount.org/.
 
And just a final note: next week’s update will be posted late Monday, Feb. 22.

It was a slow but weird week. No releases to report but a couple of new intakes—and we lost the screech.
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Let’s start with the screech, bless her heart. She remained feisty despite not eating, and I consulted my vets and colleague Kathryn Dudeck of Chattahoochee Nature Center as to further options. Because her weight wasn’t dropping rapidly, we set a baseline weight which, if she reached, would signal serious trouble. Since the weather was moderate for the middle of the week, she spent several days in the flight pen, still not eating and—not a good sign as far as vision—not moving from her low perch. 

​When the weather turned cooler again, I brought her back inside, still feisty and having dropped very little weight. She was getting fluids to keep her hydrated, so I started mixing a special formula for debilitated raptors into that, and while feeding her I noticed a dark ring around the tracheal opening in her tongue. I couldn’t remember ever seeing this on a screech before, and Kathryn indicated she’d never seen this on her screeches before either.  

Within 24 hours of being moved back in, she began losing body temperature rapidly and became unresponsive to my touch—rather than bowing up and clicking in threat, she just sat there, head bowed.

When a wild animal—any animal, to be honest—has no fight left, it’s time to call it. I euthanized her and upon examining her afterward saw that she’d trickled dark black blood from her beak, and it appeared to have come from the trachea. I’d already thrown out the possibility of cancer to Kathryn and of course, without a necropsy, we’ll never know for sure, but I’m leaning strongly toward cancer as the cause of her decline.
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The male squirrel acquired a “sister” after this little girl’s nest was destroyed. She’s about a week to 10 days older than he is, as evidenced by her greater fur growth…such as it is right now!

​Here’s a close-up of the male:

​Both are doing well and continuing to develop as they should.

​In one of those “only a mocker” situations, this guy flew into an OPEN car door. Yep, you read that right. His rescuer was in a church parking lot with her door open when he flew over her shoulder into the door, bounced off her dash and landed in her floorboard. Because he seemed just stunned, she sat him in a safe place for him to snap out of it, only when she checked a bit later, he was belly-up and she thought he’d died. When she and a friend were loading her car after their church event, the friend checked one more time and told her the bird was still alive, so she contacted LWR.

​He didn’t look so hot on intake, and I honestly wasn’t sure he’d survive the night, but this morning he was more alert, albeit still with that angled tail that suggests spinal compression and/or a pinched nerve. The good news is his wings function and he’s pooping fine; the bad news is that angled tail and inability to properly use his legs and feet. So…meds for inflammation and then wait and see…

​And adding to the weirdness, this small (even for a male) barred owl was taken to mammal rehabbers in another county when his rescuer hit a larger owl, apparently also a barred, and found this fellow grounded in the brush nearby. Perhaps the larger owl, who died during the night, before the mammal rehabbers contacted LWR, was a female and these two had a mating flight interrupted by the vehicle. Then again, barred owls aren’t real picky about eating their own species, so maybe the owl that died was after this fellow for supper—who knows?

​He was aggressive but not coordinated on intake. Nothing felt broken but a general weakness on his left side made me think a vet trip was in order to see what my physical exam might have missed. Vet Richie Hatcher at Smalley’s Animal Hospital snapped a couple of x-rays, one to check the wings and one to check the spine, and both were clear—no signs of any fractures I’d missed. That’s always good.

​No fractures, though, meant we had soft tissue or neurological issues, and honestly, only time will heal those, if they heal at all. As of this weekend, he’s alert and eating well inside, so he’ll go into the flight pen this week to see how he fares. If all goes well in the raptor flight, maybe he can be released fairly quickly.

And just to remind you once again, next weekend is the Great Backyard Bird Count, and I encourage y’all, wherever you live, to participate. It’s one of the most flexible bird counts there is: you can just count for 15 minutes or up to all day—or all weekend, if you have that kind of time—and you don’t even have to list birds you’re not sure you can identify correctly. I enjoy participating because there’s nearly always a bird or two I hear but don’t see whose call I’m not familiar with, since early spring migration has already started here, and then I get the fun of researching what that bird might be!