LWR escaped mostly unscathed from Irma’s destructive path through Georgia: power out for 70 hours but no loss of frozen mice, small limbs scattered all over the place, a medium-sized chinaberry tree down over the path to the raptor flight—nothing that can’t be fixed. Irma also resulted in 13 intakes in two days, after people’s power started being restored and roads cleared.
The poor red-tail who was awaiting Irma’s departure for x-rays didn’t survive, however. She died Tuesday night but I took the carcass in for x-rays Wednesday, anyway, as we needed to know if the GSW had caused her death. She’d been eating well and just keeled over, but she was also starvation-thin on intake. Surprisingly, the x-rays revealed only one pellet near her shoulder that wouldn’t have precluded flight after the wound healed; vet Peggy Hobby of Smalley’s Animal Hospital and I feel it was the stress of the wound, compounded with her emaciated state, that caused her death. The game warden does know who the guilty party is; in this instance there was an eyewitness, so the shooter will be prosecuted.
The MIKIs were all released late this morning and were quite happy to gain their freedom, although I’ll miss the mouthy little rascals. Safe migration, babies, and Godspeed!
Their release meant the red-tail with possible vision impairment could go into the raptor flight, where he put on a good threat display and gave me lovely stink-eye in an attempt to intimidate me. Oooh, I’m shakin’ in my boots…
The hummer from last week who had a probable coracoid fracture died mid-week this week—stress from captivity and the urge to migrate without the physical ability to do so most likely caused his death.
Three additional hummers came in, all on the same day. One was DOA; one was released after 24 hours’ observation; one is still with us.
Three additional hummers came in, all on the same day. One was DOA; one was released after 24 hours’ observation; one is still with us.
A very young quail didn’t last three hours after intake. Quail are stressy little things when they’re young, and this poor wee one wouldn’t self-feed, which quail normally do from hatching. This meant further stressing him out by handling him to force-feed—never a good thing with a bird that’s already showing massive signs of stress and debilitation.
Three pre-fledgling red-bellied woodpeckers also came in after the tree their nest was in was downed by Irma. One, the one on the far right in the photo, died overnight; a second died the next night. The first death I expected—you can look at the bird in the photo and see it’s not looking healthy. The second death took me by surprise, as the bird was eating well and active right up till lights-out and dead the next morning. The third red belly is in the songbird flight now and will be released in the coming week.
Three mourning doves were also orphaned by Irma, two about the same age and one a little younger. All are doing well and have healthy appetites.
And the week ended with the intake of three flying squirrels orphaned by Irma, two females and a male. Sadly, the runt female didn’t make it through her first night at LWR. The surviving flyers are doing well and gaining weight daily. They’re still in the “eat and crash” phase; within another week or so, they should become slightly more active. These babies are about four weeks old and flyers aren’t released until they’re about 20 weeks old, which would put their release date in late December/early January. Obviously, that ain’t gonna happen; you can’t release flyers into a winter landscape with no nest and no larder of winter goodies, even though they’d join the colony in the woods here. They’ll overwinter at LWR.
RSS Feed
