‘Cause sometimes ya draw a blank when trying to come up with a good header…
The nestling great horned continues to thrive and make clear his utter disdain for his feeder. If he’d only learn to self-feed, his feeder could just drop the food in the box, but noooo… If he drops a rodent bit, he totally ignores it; it no longer exists. Nobody ever said great horneds were smart; in fact, I like to say they have just two functional brain cells that only communicate regarding food or mating—and in the case of youngsters, they don’t communicate at all…
The nestling great horned continues to thrive and make clear his utter disdain for his feeder. If he’d only learn to self-feed, his feeder could just drop the food in the box, but noooo… If he drops a rodent bit, he totally ignores it; it no longer exists. Nobody ever said great horneds were smart; in fact, I like to say they have just two functional brain cells that only communicate regarding food or mating—and in the case of youngsters, they don’t communicate at all…
The adult barred, on the other hand, exhibited a complete failure to thrive. She refused to self-feed and spat out everything she was force-fed. After 10 days of struggling and failing to get her to keep at least a mouse or two down, I made the difficult decision to humanely euthanize.
A volunteer restrained the young black vulture last Monday while I wrapped his wing. We were so proud of ourselves for our efficiency that neither of us snapped a pic of the finished result. Knowing how smart and mischief-prone vultures are, I should’ve known better…Within four hours the little snot had mostly ripped off the wrap; by the next morning, it was all off. Because the risk is always present that a bird who rips off wing wraps will do further damage in trying to remove the wraps, I opted not to attempt a re-wrap. This means, however, that his wing will continue to droop and the chances of healing for flight go from minuscule to nonexistent. This, in turn, means he will require euthanasia, as a non-flighted vulture cannot be released.
A volunteer restrained the young black vulture last Monday while I wrapped his wing. We were so proud of ourselves for our efficiency that neither of us snapped a pic of the finished result. Knowing how smart and mischief-prone vultures are, I should’ve known better…Within four hours the little snot had mostly ripped off the wrap; by the next morning, it was all off. Because the risk is always present that a bird who rips off wing wraps will do further damage in trying to remove the wraps, I opted not to attempt a re-wrap. This means, however, that his wing will continue to droop and the chances of healing for flight go from minuscule to nonexistent. This, in turn, means he will require euthanasia, as a non-flighted vulture cannot be released.
The screech is presenting a conundrum. He seems to be able to see; he can find his food. But the constantly dilated pupils in both eyes and his lack of response to anything other than being handled are definitely NOT normal, and he still shows no ability to fly properly. We call this ADR—ain’t doin’ right. Does he have lingering head trauma? Is there soft tissue damage? Is there some other underlying issue that we missed? We’ll give him more time to see how things play out.
There will be no update next Sunday, March 22.
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