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Another week, another slew of babies…

6/26/2016

Another busy week at LWR, with more intakes, a few releases, and more on the way later today…
The miraculous news for the past week is the frouncy red shoulder has made a full recovery! If you’ll recall, last week he couldn’t stand on intake, was rail-thin, and his mouth and throat were a frouncy mess. He’s now self-feeding, full of red shoulder attitude, and will be releasable as soon as he puts a little meat on his bones!

Yes, my box is a mess and NO, I do NOT want you to clean it!

Wait, clean box means more mice? Okay, then...

The older blue jay was released last week; he came in as a fledgling and was antsy to get back into the “real” world from the get-go. I heard him once or twice day of release but never saw him. He was totally self-feeding, though, so I’m not too worried.

The younger jay, however, still wants to beg for food from the martin—none of the other birds in the flight, just the martin. Go figure. I’ve tried to catch this on video, as it’s pretty hysterical, but the uncooperative rascal has a sixth sense about when I’m about to video and will stop his silly antics until I put the camera away…

Yeah, the martin’s still in the flight. He flies well but low, and the alacrity with which he took up ground feeding worries me. Martins are supposed to be aerial insectivores, but apparently he didn’t get that memo!

As soon as the weather cooperates, two mockers, two Carolina wrens and two mourning doves are ready for release, with two nestling mourning doves waiting in the wings (no pun intended) to take their places.

This woodpecker hatchling came from a mammal rehabber who said the lady who brought it to her heard it hit the concrete—her description was it sounded like a walnut hitting the ground. He was VERY young and extremely bruised, but his eager feeding had me hopeful he was just bruised—no internal bleeding. Unfortunately, he died within 24 hours of intake. (His beak is NOT injured; that’s a normal look for very young woodpeckers!)

The crow is nearing release stage and is quite antsy now, meeting me at the flight pen door and trying to slip past me. He’s in the dilapidated old flight because I had nowhere else to put him, but despite its state of disrepair, he’s enjoying being outside.

The GHOs are keeping busy finding new ways to trash the raptor flight, including shredding the fake hornet’s nest I hung in there to deter wasp nests (it was fairly effective before its untimely demise, if you’re wondering). The screech and barred owl both need to be in the flight, so the GHOs have to get their acts together pretty soon now. These two have waited their turns long enough. (And no, they can’t go in together; the barred would eat the screech before I could shut the door good.)

Eurasian collared doves are larger than mourning doves but I’ve never seen aggression between the two species. This beauty came in with a broken wing and since the fracture was obviously close to the joint, my plan was to euthanize her. That was before she flew halfway across the room when I reached in to pick her up for euthanasia. Any bird with a wing fracture that can still manage that kind of flight deserves a chance. We can always euthanize later if need be, but once it’s done you can’t take it back.

The tiny Mississippi kite with the puncture wound is rapidly becoming less tiny. His wound has healed beautifully, and he’s starting to get little wing feathers!

The great crested flycatcher is definitely identifiable as such now. I love all the scruffy fuzz they have as they feather out. And their sweet little personalities don’t hurt a bit, either!

And the last four intakes actually come from close to home. My father adores his barn swallows so when he found one of the nestlings from the latest clutch on the ground and another dead nearby late yesterday, I took the live baby. Today he noticed that the parents weren’t feeding the lone baby left in the nest. From a secure vantage point we watched as they completely avoided going near the nest—totally out of character for barn swallows. I suspected maybe the fourth, missing nestling might be dead in the nest, so we grabbed a ladder and rescued the abandoned baby and checked the nest—no dead sib. Yesterday’s rescue is doing well; today’s, the runt, is still slightly dehydrated and lethargic. We’ll see how he does.

And this morning my nephew, checking to see what his dogs were barking at, found a fledgling grackle and a nestling mocker within a few feet of each other. Rather than risk the dogs attacking them, he brought them to LWR. The grackle will be headed for the flight pen as soon as he shows me he can self-feed; the mocker has a while before it’s ready for the flight.

Bless their hearts, young grackles ain’t got much goin’ for ‘em. They don’t have pretty voices; they’re butt-ugly babies; as fledglings they look like they survived an attempted scalping…But once they reach adulthood, they clean up real nice (aside from the voice—ain’t no helpin’ that voice)!

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Incoming, outgoing and “steady as she goes”

6/19/2016

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Last week was another week of releases, intakes and them what ain’t goin’ nowhere just yet, thanks.

The red-headed woodpeckers fledged, did their time in the flight and left without a backward glance. I’ve noticed the red-headeds don’t tend to hang around and mooch like the red-bellies do—I love how different species react differently upon release. I do hear and occasionally see them in the trees around the flight but they’ve made it abundantly clear they don’t want anything else from me!

The phoebe also headed to the flight and was released late in the week. She’s also still hanging around but not coming down for handouts—more a case of “hey there, I know you, human!”

The bluebird fledgling who came in last Sunday did require euthanasia. Vet Peggy Hobby and I discussed options because we were both reluctant to euthanize a bluebird, but the sad truth was there was nothing else to be done. The leg was too badly damaged.

A nestling robin came in yesterday with a similar injury but his leg wasn’t initially flopping uselessly and he had some use of his foot, so I was cautiously optimistic he might have a chance. Like bluebirds, robins are in the thrush family, and I just have a general soft spot for thrushes.

However, this morning the swelling had gone down and we had a massively floppy, useless leg and foot. I’ll give him some time to see if he’ll stay confined to a donut to give the bone time to heal without a splint. I can clearly see the break and it’s too high for a splint but not in the joint—and we have the advantage that his bones are still growing—so in this case a little more time may pay off. We’ll see.

The barred owl is going stir-crazy and needs to be in the raptor flight but until the GHOs pass the live prey test and the youngest has a little more time to mature, he’s stuck inside. Remember, raptors of different species don’t play well together.

Sadly, the hunger strike fledgling red-shouldered hawk required euthanasia. His refusal to eat on his own meant force-feeding, and the stress from captivity and force-feeding was just too much on him. He began spitting his food back out at every feeding and as his weight dropped precipitously, he became progressively weaker. Rather than watch him starve and stress himself to death, I opted for euthanasia. Sometimes it’s the only release we can offer.

However, an adult red shoulder came in last week, severely emaciated, weak and with the worst case of frounce I’ve seen in a while. I honestly didn’t expect him to survive the first night. He’s on a liquid diet—small, frequent feedings, because larger meals and solids at this point would likely kill him; his system couldn’t handle the energy expenditure to digest them—and is being treated for the frounce. He’s gone from unable to stand to standing briefly after each feeding, but his survival is still very iffy and he has some sort of mild head tic, as well. This is literally a “feeding by feeding” scenario. Every time he’s alive for the next feeding, it’s a small miracle.

The crow is also going stir-crazy but crows pretty much don’t get along with anyone other than crows, so he can’t go into the songbird flight, poor fellow. Right now, LWR feels like a congested airport, with planes backed up on the runway awaiting takeoff. The crow is at the back of that line for the moment! I did resort today to putting him in the dilapidated old flight just so he could stretch his wings a bit and not be so confined. We’ll see how that goes as at least a daytime alternative for a while.

The screech also needs to be in the raptor flight but is less antsy than the larger birds—he’s pretty happy as long as he gets fed and I leave one or two desiccated, disemboweled mouse carcasses in his cage for him to “cache”. I mean, you know, he only gets fed every day—never know when those stashed mice might come in handy…

Both blue jays are in the songbird flight now and are typical silly jays. The video clip below is one of the rare times they’re actually quiet!

Both of the thrashers died last week, several days apart and with no prior indication there was an issue; rehabbers call it sudden death syndrome. They’re fine at lights-out and dead the next morning. It’s frustrating because we have no warning and no clue WHY they die.

The lone martin is now flying fairly well—still not holding altitude like I’d prefer, so we’ll give him another week and see how he progresses.

We have three mockers, one of whom was cat-caught. Say it with me, people: CATS BELONG INDOORS. Thankfully, he wasn’t injured before he was rescued and is on meds as a prophylactic measure. He and the other fledgling are actually in the flight pen but because mockers are such shameless beggars it’s quite easy to medicate him while he’s begging “FEEEED MEEEE!!”

The youngest of the mockers, still a half-feathered nestling, was fed a crap diet of bird seed and Gravy Train dog food for two days before his finder got him to LWR. Repeat after me, people: WHEN I FIND WILDLIFE, I WILL NOT FEED IT UNTIL I HAVE TALKED WITH A LICENSED REHABBER, AND I WILL CALL A REHABBER IMMEDIATELY.

If only people would do just that…

These five Carolina wrens are from three separate locations. One was fed bread and blueberries, a crap diet that killed his sib, before he was brought to LWR. Two were given nothing to eat for 12 hours and were so weak, cold, and lethargic on intake that I honestly didn’t expect them to live, given the general stressiness of Caros. Surprisingly, all five are doing well at the moment—with wrens, though, everything can go to pot in a heartbeat.

The oldest Caro, who should’ve been released this week, refuses to leave just yet. That steady supply of mealworms in the songbird flight is just too enticing!

And the brown thrasher who was released the previous week opted to march his little feathered butt right back into the flight in front of me one day last week…Talk about failure to launch…I did get a video of him living up to his name, thrashing about for food in the grass behind the flight before he, umm, returned to the fold, though.

I misidentified this poor nestling at least three times over two days as I debated what she was: mocker? No. Barn swallow? Too big. Catbird? Nope. I knew something was familiar but given my lack of sleep and over 25 gaping beaks to stuff, I honestly didn’t have a lot of time to dwell on it; identity simmered on the back burner until this morning, when it finally clicked: flat beak, orange gape, white flanges…she’s a great-crested flycatcher! I normally see them as mostly feathered nestlings or fledglings but they’re a delight at any age. Great cresteds are among my favorite birds to rehab because of their adorable personalities.

And this downy Mississippi kite was thought by his rescuers to be either a “baby crow or eagle”. They looked it up online and he looked similar to both…Ummm…not exactly…Unfortunately, they fed him tuna and gave him water before getting him to a mammal rehabber south of LWR who, after working a full day at her paying job, left her furry charges in the care of her husband and, with her son riding shotgun, delivered this baby to LWR at 9pm. (Yeah, I’m working on bringing her over to the “bird side” but her job may preclude that…) Because of the real risk of aspiration pneumonia from the water he was given and due to his injuries, he’s on meds.

He was probably a victim of a crow raid on his nest, given the plucked back and single puncture wound that would be about crow-beak size. Crows will predate squirrel nests and eat the babies; they’ll do the same to songbird nests, and they’re not above raiding the nests of smaller raptors. Why am I not railing against crows raiding nests? Well, folks, that’s NATURE in action. It’s a WILD bird doing what it’s supposed to do, not someone’s ill-cared-for pet roaming free and wreaking havoc. See the difference?

At any rate, the little guy is doing well; his back is healing nicely and he’s got a healthy appetite. And he’s about the cutest thing I’ve seen this baby season.

Yes, the scale reads 33.0g. That's just over an ounce!

This and the following photos were taken near lights-out for the night--can you tell by the sleepy look in his little eyes?

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“My days are so busy…,” part the second

6/12/2016

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It was another busy week, with the usual intakes and releases—in one form or another.

First, two of the three purple martins were released just this morning! I’d worried that the third, the runt, might not be ready but decided to try him anyway, as his sibs were chomping at the bit for freedom. Sadly, he wasn’t, but his sibs took off with great joy into a martin colony on the property of Michelle and Bill Hubbard. You may recall Michelle is one of the vets at Smalley’s, and she and Bill graciously allowed me to release these young birds on their lovely site.

The runt will be at LWR a while longer while he figures things out…

As you can see from the above video, the juvie mourning dove is in the flight pen now. He’s…not quite right. I can’t put my finger on the issue. He eats well; he’s alert—I dunno; my gut says there’s an issue I’m not seeing yet. We’ll see…

Six Carolina wrens, pre-fledges from two separate nests were found in local eatery parking lots; sadly, neither clutch lived 24 hours past intake. Carolina wrens are high-stress birds and we don’t know how long these babies were in their respective parking lots before being found. Adding insult to injury for one clutch, they wandered in the rain before being rescued; the second clutch must’ve been down a while because the rescuer said there were bread crumbs near them in the parking lot.

All together now, boys and girls: BABY BIRDS DO NOT EAT BREAD.

We have one lone Carolina wren holdout in the songbird flight, but she’s getting antsy, so she’ll be outta here this week.

Geniuses in another county knew they had a nest of barn swallows on their porch, yet in their infinite wisdom, they opted to leave the porch ceiling fan on. One of the babies fledged right into the fan blades. On intake it looked to be a coracoid fracture, similar to a collarbone fracture in humans. However, despite feedings every half hour for 14 hours a day, the poor swallow lost weight rapidly and was euthanized on the fourth day of weight loss.

A woman was enjoying watching a nest of baby birds on her porch when one morning last week she heard a thump and looked out to see a snake. She said she was initially going to take a photo of the snake but when she saw he had one of “her” babies in its mouth, she took action to scare the snake into dropping the bird. Unfortunately, all his sibs had been eaten and he was thoroughly traumatized.

I’m leaning toward Eastern phoebe, although least flycatcher is also a possibility. He’s still very easily spooked; just changing his paper causes him to hunker down in defensive mode. But he does call for food and eat readily, so I think he’s gonna be okay.

The possum was released just yesterday. Immediately upon his feet touching the ground, he began digging for nice, juicy grubs and such. He was quite a happy camper!

The brown thrasher who came in with a DOA sib was released last week, as well. He’s still hanging around the brush near the songbird flight but makes it quite clear he needs nothing from me. Below is a short clip of him in the flight the day before release.

The cat-attacked thrasher in last week’s update didn’t make it, despite meds. People, KEEP YOUR CATS INDOORS.

However, two more thrashers came in, one cat-attacked and one birdnapped. Again, KEEP YOUR CATS INDOORS. And for God’s sake, remember that recent fledglings don’t fly well and spend a lot of time on the ground or flitting from one low branch to another. Unless they’re injured or in danger, LEAVE THEM ALONE and let the parents finish their job.

Prime example of the right time to intervene: Lady found a blue jay, older fledgling, in her carport with a puncture wound to the head. Because she was unsure if the wound was from another bird or from free-roaming cats, she called LWR and asked if she should intervene. Since cat attack was a distinct possibility, I said yes; we’d do meds to be safe.

While he bonded well with the thrashers, he’s taken a while longer to accept me as a surrogate parent. Happily, he’s doing well and he and the thrashers will be flight pen-bound this week.

Two more examples of the right time to intervene: Yesterday lady found a pre-fledgling blue jay in her yard surrounded by her inconsiderate neighbor’s cats. Our rescuer’s husband has severe cat allergies but the neighbor refuses to keep her cats out of the rescuer’s yard (and while I’m not a fan of knee-jerk litigation, I’d be considering it here), so not only can they not enjoy their own yard, they have to worry about the safety of the birds on their property.

Luckily, this jay was uninjured but we had no way of knowing if cat saliva was on his feathers. To LWR, then, for meds. Better safe than sorry.

And just this afternoon, a man called with a “small bluish bird” with a leg injury—an obvious case for intervention. It was a fledgling bluebird, and I honestly don’t think the leg is fixable. It’s broken, feels like at the hip. We’ll see what can be done, though, because it hurts my heart worse than usual to have to euthanize a bluebird. They’re a special species to me.

The red-bellied woodpeckers turned out to be red-headed woodpeckers. They’re *thisclose* to fledging and heading for the flight. If you’ve ever wondered what goes on in a woodpecker nest between feedings, wonder no more…

The heron chick declined precipitously overnight, going from a bright-eyed, alert, vocal baby who was even picking up his own dropped minnows to a cold, lethargic, dull-eyed, quiet baby who couldn’t even keep down a fish slurry. The dropping body temp was despite his being on low heat. When a baby on heat is losing body heat, there’s a problem. I struggled to keep him going for a few hours that morning and then called it, poor baby.

The great horned owls, screech, barred owl and red shouldered hawk show no real change from last week. The GHOs still refuse to touch live prey; the screech would eat the GHOs if he was big enough; the barred owl is finally eating on his own; the red shoulder still requires force-feeding.

The crow is…well, a crow. He’s noisy, messy, demanding and throws tantrums. Typical corvid. Honestly, I don’t know why I love the aggravating rascals so.

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“My days are so busy; it’s makin’ me dizzy—there’s so much I gotta do!”

6/5/2016

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(With apologies to Broadway musical sensation Something Rotten)

GAWD, I’m not even sure where to begin…For starters, LWR passed the century mark in intakes by the end of May. There are birds in every conceivable space and more just came in.

Two of the three cardinals were released last week; we have one stubborn holdout, and the brown thrasher also refuses to leave, preferring to hang out with the older one awaiting a molt to grow in new flight feathers.

The formerly goo-covered mocker was also released.

With one mocker out, four more came in. Two are sibs; the other two are unrelated. The sibs were found in a nest in a car about to be crushed; one of the older nestlings had been fed a crap diet for several days before coming to LWR and was wearing about as much as he apparently ate. One eye was gummed shut; it was caked over one ear; both wrists were covered; he even had a big clump of the stuff on his butt. I didn’t get “before” shots; he needed cleaning ASAP so he could be housed with the younger mockers. But in the photos below you can see the clumps of crap food that came off his little body, along with some feathers—and I wasn’t even pulling on this; I was rolling a damp Q-tip over the mess to gently work it out and still didn't get it all out to begin with.

The fourth mocker is slightly larger than crap food guy; he just came in today and I haven’t had a chance to get photos.

The scalped mourning dove took a turn for the worse and required euthanasia, as did the poor common ground dove, who’d been found cold and unresponsive three days last week but revived when placed on heat. His feather growth just stopped—it was more in keeping with what I’m used to seeing in woodpecker runts, where they reach a certain level of development and just stop growing.

The puncture-wound dove isn’t looking likely for flight. I was hopeful that no tendons or ligaments had been damaged but she’s in the songbird flight and as yet unable to fly.

A young loon, not yet in breeding plumage, came in; his rescuer was convinced his legs were broken. Nope, loons’ legs are located waaay back on their bodies. They can’t walk at all on land, and they’re such heavy birds they require a water “runway” to even gain flight. This guy was observed for 24 hours after intake and released. He was a happy camper to be back on water!

Three of the four Carolina wrens are in the flight pen now; the fourth—the starvation victim—sadly died a few hours after last week’s update. Wrens who’re allowed to reach that point of starvation seldom do well long-term but I had hoped he would since he seemed to rebound nicely.

Late last Sunday a caller said she had what she originally thought was an Eastern meadowlark fledgling that—yep, you guessed it—she’d been feeding for nearly a week and now that he was “trying to fly” she miraculously discovered LWR. That seems to happen a helluva a lot, so excuse me if I’m cynical when someone swears they had NO CLUE until suddenly they’re tired of dealing with the bird or have screwed it up so badly all I can do is end its misery.

This bird, a fledgling orchard oriole, was lucky enough to be at an age where a bad diet did less damage than it would’ve in a nestling. He’s still lighter than I’d like, not from lack of food but I’m afraid his bones aren’t as dense as they should be. In other words, he was on the verge of being another MBD victim. Good nutrition seems to’ve made the difference, though, and Mr. Lightweight is in the songbird flight now, as well.

Two more red-bellied woodpeckers came in, nestlings this time. They’re doing well and, typical red bellies, never shut up. Never…

Sadly, this adult red belly was most likely cat attacked; its rescuers didn’t see the attack but said there was a free-roaming cat in their neighborhood. The damage to the wing was too severe to repair, so the bird was euthanized.

This fledgling crow isn’t flying well yet, as is typical of recent fledges. He’s alert, curious and expects to eat some of whatever he sees me feeding other birds, which makes for an interesting diet for him. Luckily, crows are generalists and he’s at the age to start exploring new foods.

This means he gets the occasional minnow from the heron feedings. Yep, we have a teeninsy heron chick who weighed all of 21g on intake and is up to 29g as of today. This small, we’re all guessing it’s a green heron but until feathers come in, we won’t know for sure. Herons can be challenging, especially one this young, but so far, so good. Fingers crossed.

Two more brown thrashers, recent fledges, arrived within the past couple of days, as well. One was probably cat-attacked and is on meds; the other was birdnapped from the finder’s yard. Folks, fledglings as a rule don’t fly well. They hop. A lot. They have really short tail feathers and maybe even some “baby fuzz” still on their heads. If you see a bird hopping through your yard screaming for food, watch carefully for a few minutes, and you’ll more than likely see one or more sibs doing the same thing—and parents coming down to feed. If the fledgling is injured or in imminent danger, yes, by all means intervene, rescue and call your nearest songbird rehabber. Otherwise, leave the fledgling with his family!

The same scenario applies to this juvie mourning dove. A child found it on the ground and assumed it couldn’t fly. By the time the bird had been passed from family member to family member and stuffed in a hoodie, it was so stressed that for 24 hours after intake it refused to even open its eyes. I was honestly beginning to wonder if the poor fellow was blind. So tip number 2: If you do in fact need to rescue a fledgling, DON’T use it for show and tell. Handle it as little as possible. Put it in a cardboard box lined with paper towels or an old T-shirt, place it in a quiet place, and CALL YOUR LOCAL SONGBIRD REHABBER ASAP.

These purple martins are close to fledging and should be in the flight pen by next week, probably early next week. Apparently both their parents were killed, necessitating intervention.

The red shoulder and barred owl are still being pains in the arse about eating, partially, I suspect, because they don’t like their digs. I don’t blame them; they’re both at the age to be in the raptor flight, but since the GHOs are out there, it’s officially full until they pass the live prey test—which all three failed with great flair this week.

Unlike songbirds, raptors don’t play well together. They eat each other. So while the songbird flight can have multiple species co-existing in relative peace, the raptor flight can only house one species at a time.

The screech is finally doing some self-feeding, although he still expects some degree of hand-feeding—meaning at this point literally handing him the food and letting him do the rest. He also is pretty much ready for the flight pen…

If you’ll recall last week I was delighted to report that the youngest GHO, the one with the nasty wrist fracture that we were sure precluded his ever flying, was in fact flying quite well. Below for your viewing pleasure are a couple of clips of him doing just that!

And finally, the oldest GHO was both hot and peeved with me the other day—I had dared to clean up the leftover rodent bits below his perch to keep ants out of the flight. But all he knew was I was taking his snacking material for later. Sorry, buddy…

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Another week, another slew of babies…

Incoming, outgoing and “steady as she goes”

“My days are so busy…,” part the second

“My days are so busy; it’s makin’ me dizzy—there’s so much I gotta do!”

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