Steady as she goes…

It was a fairly typical week at LWR: releases, new intakes, euthanasias, people totally ignorant of the geography of the state…
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Leading with the releases, the barred owl who’d been a guest at LWR for a couple of weeks was released last Sunday about an hour before sunset. As antsy as she’d been, I was sure she’d bolt from the box and thought I was prepared, but I still barely managed to capture her flight to freedom on video!

​She sat there for less than five minutes while she got her bearings and—tired of being harassed by what sounded like nuthatches, although I never actually saw them—took off for deeper brush. 

​The last of the nestling mourning doves who came in back in the late summer was also released mid-week and is still hanging around the yard. He’s molting, so he looks a bit scruffy!

​Sadly, the barred owl from last week that was cut from barbed wire with no anesthesia by the people who found him required euthanasia. I was afraid this would be the case, as the skin was in tatters and the tendons and ligaments looked to’ve been hacked to bits in the process. Vet Richie Hatcher of Smalley’s Animal Hospital examined the wing and shook his head. “There’s nothing we can do with this.” The photos  of the wing below were taken after euthanasia.

​And this juvenile mourning dove was found in people’s carport. They thought he had a broken leg; actually, both legs and feet were deformed—a nest injury that wouldn’t have been noticeable until he fledged and couldn’t walk or perch. You can see scabbing on the most deformed leg where he’d tried to walk. Given his disheveled feathers, I suspect he’d also been cat-attacked. Again, after examining the dove, Richie agreed with my initial assessment that euthanasia was required.

​With the release of the healthy barred owl, the raptor flight, like a Depression-era flophouse, barely had time to cool before the red-tailed hawk moved in. He’s stubbornly refusing to let me SEE him fly. I know he moves from one end of the flight to the other to get his food, as I place it at the opposite end from wherever he’s perched—so he HAS to come get it. But the stubborn rascal won’t SHOW me he’s flying, and I need to see him in flight before I’ll release him. Maybe next week…

And now let’s soapbox for a moment, shall we? People, please explain to me just HOW you can live in a given state for any length of time and not have some dim notion of its general geography. How? I mean, really? Just yesterday I got a call from Hall County—see map below for the distance between Hall and Laurens Counties. The caller was irate that I wouldn’t drive all the way to Hall County to get the injured bird in her yard. There were closer options for this caller had she bothered to stay on the line and let me direct her to the list of rehabbers in the state but she chose to cop an attitude, get rude and hang up.

Folks, Georgia is the largest state east of the Mississippi. Look at its size. I’m one of about NINE songbird rehabbers in the state and one of about EIGHTEEN raptor rehabbers in the state (effectively nine, as half the raptor rehabbers are vets who do triage only). Do you see why I don’t pick up birds anymore?

I tried for years to at least meet people halfway, but even that lessened the quality of care I provided to the birds currently under my care and seriously impacted the time I had for my paying job—because remember, rehabbers don’t receive salaries from the state or feds; most of us do have to work to pay the bills and keep the lights on. If I’m to be an effective rehabber, I need to actually be on the premises caring for the birds here now. I can’t drive all over the state, nor can any other rehabber. Even if finances weren’t an issue, we have to put the critters currently in our care first; it’s up to the public to get the wildlife they find to us.
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And for God’s sake, learn something about the geography of your state so you have some idea of the distances between various points in the state. Honestly, that should’ve been taught in 4th grade; that’s when I learned it…

​Moving on to more pleasant topics—certainly cuter!—yet another flyer came in this week, making a total of seven now. And in typical flyer fashion, the newcomer was greeted with enthusiastic grooming—see video below. This is one of the major behavioral differences between grays and flyers: after a certain age, grays bark and squeal at newcomers and are just generally obnoxious to ‘em. Flyers, being social creatures, adopt a “the more, the merrier” attitude. (No clue why YouTube opted to turn it vertically; it played horizontally on my computer when I uploaded it...)

​Even when they tussle over food, it’s less violent than grays.

​They’re adorable when they sleep…

​…and when they eat…

Basically, they’re just adorable, period.
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As a bonus, you never know what’ll show up at the feeders; I caught this mole scrabbling around below one of the feeders this week, totally oblivious to me kneeling down to video his activity.  Based on that glossy fur, I’d say he’s probably a frequent visitor to the feeders, taking advantage of what the birds and squirrels knock out!