Wildlife rehab is full of miracles of varying degrees, but each one never ceases to amaze me. It’s always a reminder that rehabbers are just the conduit; the real work comes from the birds themselves.

Remember last week’s older, emaciated, weak red tail who just wouldn’t eat? The one I was sure I’d have to call it on? Yeah, well, after nearly 10 days a switch flipped and he suddenly began eating on his own. Voraciously. And his level of alertness and threat response—his reaction to me opening his box to feed him or change his paper—increased by about a hundred-fold, to normal levels.

Understand, I didn’t do anything except not give up on the bird. He did all the heavy lifting. Now we just get some weight back on him and he should be good for release!

The red tail recovering from the ruptured crop, after staging three jailbreaks in the house, is now in the mini-pen and bouncing off the walls. Literally. All day long, with the windows open now that we’re finally getting some cooler weather, I hear the repetitive thud-thud-thud of him trying to figure out how to stage a jailbreak from the mini-pen. Next step is the raptor flight this week, to see how he does, and then release. He’s eating well and eagerly, so appetite and crop function aren’t an issue anymore. That crop has healed beautifully.

The red tail recovering from the broken elbow will move into the mini-pen once the “crop” red tail is in the raptor flight—again, this week, probably early in the week.

Meanwhile, the poor red phase screech, who was doing so well with his recovery, has been moved back inside so the larger birds can have the outside flights. He’s not a happy camper about that. But then, screeches are seldom happy about anything...it’s part of their charm. (And I’m not being facetious there; y’all know how I love my pissy little screeches.) As you can see, he's back to being a blur of threatening motion. I'm just terrified, of course...quaking in my boots...

There will be no update next Sunday, Oct. 31—just a heads-up.

LWR had no new intakes this week and one release, so it was almost like a vacation...if your idea of a vacation involves thawing mice daily and fighting with a recalcitrant bird to feed and medicate it...

So let’s start with THAT bird—the red tail who’s recovering from a ruptured crop. See, in his mind, nothing’s wrong with him. His wings work. His feet work. His crop works. So why’s he in captivity and being force-fed food and meds?

You ever tried explaining to an aggressive and confused raptor that he needs your help, whether he believes it or not? Yeah, they don’t listen so well...

So far he’s punctured the backs of both hands, through the handling gloves.  The tip of my index finger twice-daily has a new blood blister or outright puncture from feeding him, because he stubbornly refuses to self-feed. That fingertip is numb. I get slapped in the face twice daily by his powerful wings as he bates and tries to get away from me when I take him out to feed and medicate.

And I insulted his ancestry by exasperatedly asking him one morning last week if he was sure he didn’t have some Coop somewhere in his background...
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On the plus side, his crop IS functioning beautifully and he only has a few more days on meds—and every morning, like clockwork, there’s a fresh pellet in his box. As soon as he’s off meds and will self-feed, Mister Spastic is going into the mini-pen and then the raptor flight to finish out his recuperation.

​The red tail recovering from the elbow fracture, while not a “teddy bear,” is certainly laid-back compared to his next-box neighbor and lives to eat. Honestly. I think I could drag in an adult black bear and this fellow would attempt to eat it all. He’s what colleague Steve Hicks describes as a “light eater”—as long as there’s light, he’ll eat. Another week or so and he’ll be ready for the mini-pen. 

​The mature red tail, I’m pretty sure, is just an old bird trying to die. He has no injuries; he’s been treated for frounce and capillaria, but he just sits in his box with his head feathers ruffled when he’s awake. Most of the time he tucks his head and sleeps. All day. He eats very little, even when hand fed. He’s just old and tired and as much as I hate to, I may call it on him this week to allow him to die with dignity.

​The gray phase screech self-released early last week when I walked into the mini-pen to feed both screeches. I wasn’t surprised. He was flying beautifully and I’d planned to release him anyway; he just beat me to it. This photo was taken the day before he flew the coop.

The red phase is looking good. Flights are still short and a bit wobbly but the wing is pretty level, so...we’ll see. He’ll have to come back inside when the red tails are ready to be moved outside.  The chess pieces get moved around the board as needs demand and space allows...
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As are most screeches, he’s a master of stink-eye. This expression is priceless! “I see you, and I don’t approve. Go away.”

For the uninitiated, that’s how we Southerners start a really good tale, be it true or tall. In this case, it’s true, and it’s amazing!

Thursday night an area game warden called with a downed red tail. I asked all the pertinent questions about what injuries he could reasonably detect with the naked eye, and he said the bird had some sort of “muscle” exposed on its chest. Not good. I suspected then it was a ruptured crop and told him as much.

When he arrived with the bird, sure enough, it was a ruptured crop. Friday morning I contacted vet Richie Hatcher at Magnolia Grove Veterinary Clinic and asked if he could see the red tail. He said of course.
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When Richie examined the bird we both agreed that, given the alternative was euthanasia, it was worth a try to fix the crop. The rupture was fresh; the edges were still pink, moist and healthy. After he injected lidocaine around the wound, opting for local anesthesia (safer for such a short procedure) rather than gassing the bird down, Richie proceeded to suture the crop shut while I restrained the bird and vet tech Samantha Wells used my phone to take photos of the procedure. 

We agreed afterward that in addition to antibiotics, small, frequent meals were in order while the crop healed. Our hope was that there was no nerve damage in the ruptured area that might prevent the crop from functioning properly.
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Saturday morning I awoke to find a small, well-formed, fresh pellet in the bird’s box. I texted a photo of it to Richie, letting him know his efforts had paid off—the bird’s crop was functioning as it should! He was as excited as I was. 

​And this morning, the bird cast another small, well-formed pellet.  He still needs to be fed small, frequent meals to avoid stressing the crop but his prognosis is lookin’ good right now!

​Continuing on a positive note, the red tail who was recovering from the broken hand was released this morning. I tried a different approach with his release, just opening the raptor flight door and walking to the middle of the flight to see what he’d do. And what he did was scope out the open door, look at me to make sure it wasn’t a trick, and skedaddle before I could change my mind.

​The red tail recovering from the broken elbow is, obviously, still inside and the wing is looking nice and level.

​A mature red tail came in this morning with head trauma but no other apparent injury, so he just needs a little time to adjust his horizontal and vertical hold.

Of course, it’s almost never all good news in wildlife rehab: The red shoulder who’d been moved to the mini-pen required euthanasia; his wing fracture didn’t heal for flight. He couldn’t even get enough lift to reach the low perch. And a barred owl that came in last Sunday night with no apparent injuries must have had internal injuries, as he died overnight.
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The screeches have both been moved into the mini-pen. The red phase with the shoulder dislocation is looking pretty good but not capable of flight yet.  The gray phase is actually ready for release within the next couple of days.

​And I’m still excited about those pellets from the red tail, lemme tell ya...

Beginning with what’s always big news, another bald eagle came in late in the week. Additionally, LWR had three releases and a euthanasia, we did some rearranging of birds after the releases, and another screech came in this morning.
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Starting with the eagle, of course, he was a 7lb., 3oz. adult bird who came from Emmanuel County. He’d been down a while, as his tail feathers were stained about halfway up and the edges were ragged. He arrived in respiratory distress, so I quickly called Auburn before even notifying my vets at Smalley’s that I was en route with an eagle. The folks at Auburn said get him on oxygen as soon as I got to my vet clinic, so the next call was to Smalley’s as I headed out the door.

Upon arrival there, the bird was quickly placed on oxygen and over the course of about 4 hours we used 2 tanks on him. During this time vet Jim Hobby was in touch with a vet at Auburn for treatment advice, as we’d never had an eagle—or any other raptor, for that matter—come in with such difficulty breathing. The Auburn vet recommended a specific medication, so we had to weigh the bird to determine the dosage. This, of course, meant taking him off the oxygen for a few minutes, so while we had him out of the box we also snapped a quick x-ray—very quick, as the bird was starting to crash from the stress of being handled.
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Back into the box and on oxygen he went until he stabilized. Jim and I agreed the right lung looked cloudy on the x-ray, although the Auburn vet said he could tell little from it, as we snapped only the one, very quickly, before getting the bird back on oxygen.  

As soon as he calmed down a bit, I headed home with him and another dose of the meds for the next morning. We were hoping by then he’d’ve stabilized enough for transport to Auburn,  as Jim, the Auburn vet and I all agreed transporting the bird in his current condition would kill him outright.

His breathing was quieter and seemed less labored the next morning, although he wasn’t standing as he had been on the previous day. I placed him in a donut to ease his breathing even more, since he wasn’t standing. He remained alert and readily snatched food from the forceps.  I again consulted Auburn, and they recommended against transport, given that he’d gone from standing to needing a donut overnight. They also approved my plan to provide small feedings every two hours.

At some point between his 3PM and 5PM feedings he died. As I’d also been in constant contact with Bob Sargent, head of Georgia DNR’s eagle program, I alerted him to the bird’s death and he asked that the carcass be kept cool until he could send a game tech to retrieve it the next morning.

As of Friday morning, the carcass was en route to Athens for a necropsy, as we all want to know what killed the eagle.
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In better news, we did have three releases: the great horned owl, the barred owl and the sharpie. I only managed to get video of the great horned’s release.

​The red tail who came in with the massively swollen eye and had been placed in the raptor flight required euthanasia. If you recall, after the swelling went down, he still had a blood clot right at the pupil. Well, as that dissolved, the eyeball began collapsing. Over the course of last week it shriveled like a raisin. He wasn’t releasable with his eye in that shape, and it would have caused great discomfort throughout his life, so he wasn’t a good candidate for an ed bird.

​With that bird’s euthanasia, the red tail with the broken hand went into the raptor flight.

​His movement to the raptor flight freed the mini-pen for the red shoulder.

​The red tail with the elbow fracture is, of course, still confined inside while we wait for it to heal.

The screech with the dislocated shoulder also remains inside. The shoulder seems to be more level most of the time; if he gets stressed it will sometimes droop, so he’s not quite healed. (And yes, he likes to shred the paper lining his box...)

​This morning a gray-phase screech came in after flying into a man’s car last night. Literally. He said he had his windows down, heard a thud behind him, and turned to see a stunned screech sitting on the back of his seat. The screech is alert and typically screech pissy today and nothing is broken, but one pupil looks a little dilated so he’ll stay at LWR for a few days.

And on that note, let me point out that Google is NOT your friend, nor are its search results remotely accurate on most things. Upon arriving home with the stunned screech last night, the man googled what to feed what he thought was a baby great horned...and found information on Google that recommended feeding the bird shredded celery and other vegetables. Folks, raptors are MEAT EATERS. Any site that suggests feeding them veggies is run by idiots of the worst kind—probably the same fools who tell the gullible public to feed songbirds bread soaked in milk, which is a crap diet for songbirds. In short, don’t EVER trust care and feeding advice for wildlife that you find online. If you MUST keep wildlife overnight before getting it to a rehabber, ASK THE REHABBER what, if anything, it needs to be fed short-term.
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With a solid week of clear skies and mostly mild temps, the vultures have been making themselves scarce, so no photos of them this week.