Last week felt like a preview of baby season, except all intakes were, of course, adults. Busy, busy! I suspect the brief period of decent weather we experienced had people outside more, hence the rescue of birds that otherwise might not have been found or received help.
The first intake of the week was an adult male cardinal with a massive eye infection of some sort. Initially, based on the finder’s description, I feared “finch eye,” mycoplasmic conjunctivitis, which is highly contagious to other birds. When the cardie arrived, though, it was obvious this was some other type of infection, so I started meds immediately. Below you can see the progress he made. He’s good to go now but between rain, high winds and drastic temperature drops, his release has been delayed for a few days.
The first intake of the week was an adult male cardinal with a massive eye infection of some sort. Initially, based on the finder’s description, I feared “finch eye,” mycoplasmic conjunctivitis, which is highly contagious to other birds. When the cardie arrived, though, it was obvious this was some other type of infection, so I started meds immediately. Below you can see the progress he made. He’s good to go now but between rain, high winds and drastic temperature drops, his release has been delayed for a few days.
Jan. 15, intake
Jan. 17
Jan. 19
Today, Jan. 20
Then we had four intakes in one day—typical for baby season but very unusual for winter.
First thing in the morning, a juvenile Cooper’s hawk came in; he’d face-planted a window, probably in hot pursuit of his songbird prey. The songbird likely veered at the last minute; the Coop hit the window, unable to swerve away as quickly as the songbird. Coops are highly maneuverable birds, but this fellow was rail-thin, so desperation likely influenced his hunt. At any rate, he went in for x-rays and while he had no wing fractures, vet Peggy Hobby and I are pretty sure we see a coracoid fracture. As you know by know, these are hard to spot even on an x-ray, so we’re not 100% positive. Doesn’t matter; a little cage rest and some time to get some meat back on those skinny bones won’t hurt him a bit—and he’s eating like there’s no tomorrow!
First thing in the morning, a juvenile Cooper’s hawk came in; he’d face-planted a window, probably in hot pursuit of his songbird prey. The songbird likely veered at the last minute; the Coop hit the window, unable to swerve away as quickly as the songbird. Coops are highly maneuverable birds, but this fellow was rail-thin, so desperation likely influenced his hunt. At any rate, he went in for x-rays and while he had no wing fractures, vet Peggy Hobby and I are pretty sure we see a coracoid fracture. As you know by know, these are hard to spot even on an x-ray, so we’re not 100% positive. Doesn’t matter; a little cage rest and some time to get some meat back on those skinny bones won’t hurt him a bit—and he’s eating like there’s no tomorrow!
Note his full crop...
Then we had a barred owl with a wing fracture that I was convinced on intake had already started healing. X-rays sort of confirmed that—the bone is displaced but attempting to form a callus, and the muscles seem to be trying to pull the bones back into alignment. There's no instability at this point, believe it or not, so we cannot realign the bone ends--they're already "set" as they are. This may not end well, but Peggy and I agreed it was worth giving the bird time to heal to see what happens.
When the cat-attacked mocker came in, his wing felt broken at the shoulder, which x-rays confirmed. I forgot I hadn’t taken a photo of him till after we’d euthanized, so all we have for him is his x-ray, with both fractures circled.
Once again, people, repeat after me: KEEP YOUR CATS INDOORS.
This gorgeous adult male red tail showed no signs of injury on intake, and x-rays also show nothing, but his right wing droops at the shoulder—a telltale sign of a coracoid fracture. So he’s also on cage rest.
This gorgeous adult male red tail showed no signs of injury on intake, and x-rays also show nothing, but his right wing droops at the shoulder—a telltale sign of a coracoid fracture. So he’s also on cage rest.
And yesterday, one of my local game wardens delivered a great blue heron. Apparently the bird had been down since around Christmas but no one felt the need to contact LWR or DNR to seek help for the poor thing till he was too weak to stand. And he was starvation-thin on intake. Sometimes herons will refuse to stand when they’re stressed so I took him into the raptor flight to see if he’d try to stand. He lay on the ground glaring at me and attacked the camera, which I took as a good sign—he was still feisty. So I took him inside and mixed a thin slurry to start him eating. He kept it down but died three hours later anyway—too little, too late. He might have had a chance if he’d been brought to LWR a month ago…
Finally, although this wacky weather might not indicate it, spring is on the way. We already have henbit and Whitlow grass blooming!
Henbit
Whitlow grass
And a postscript—bundle up tonight and get outside to watch the full lunar eclipse! It starts around 10:30pm ET and ends around 2am ET, with full eclipse around midnight. Those aren’t exact times, but they’re good enough for government work, as Daddy used to say. Even if you just pop in and out to catch “highlights” it should be worth seeing.
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