Week of the owl

Just two new intakes this week but both were owls: a HBC barred owl and a probable HBC great horned owl.

First, though, an update on the cardinal that came in last Sunday: despite a healthy appetite, he checked out on us Tuesday. He never recovered from the paralysis, and his breathing remained labored, but he was alert and hungry…and then, within the space of an hour, he died, poor baby.

Then, on Thursday, a truly nasty day—rainy, cold and just blah—two owls came in from a neighboring county. While the same person brought both, she was transporting one for her local vet clinic, where the bird had been sitting since the beginning of the week while they tried to play rehabber. Folks, let me state right now, a vet clinic is no place for a wild animal long-term. Barking dogs and yowling cats can cause enough stress to kill wildlife. It was not a smart move to house the owl in that clinic while they played rehabber, especially not with three federally licensed raptor rehabbers within an hour’s drive north, south and east of them.
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This great horned owl has a massive eye injury; when I took him to Smalley’s Thursday afternoon, vet Jim Hobby said nothing looked displaced in the eye, although it was hard to be certain, as there was still a lot of blood, making it difficult to see the retina. We’re treating the eye and hoping for at least a partial recovery of vision in it. At least he had no fractures.

The second owl was one the transporter had found and taken to this other clinic where, inexplicably, after playing rehabber for almost a week with the GHO, they decided to refer her to an actual rehabber. Maybe the novelty had worn off; that’s usually what happens when non-licensed individuals start mucking around with things they don’t understand and have no permits for. At any rate, this poor barred owl was concussed out of his gourd; he couldn’t stand up and his eyes were tightly shut.
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Jim also examined him and again, this lucky bird also had no fractures, but both his eyes were filled with blood and very cloudy. The lenses and retinas seemed okay, as best Jim could tell through the blood, so once again, it was a matter of giving the bird time to get over the concussion. He’s still a bit loopy—head trauma can take time to resolve—but he is opening his eyes a bit more as of today, and they’re looking much clearer. 

​And while I was headed to Smalley’s, I took the red-tail back in for re-examination and new x-rays. Our original x-ray had just been the injured wing, which had a pellet lodged in the head of the bone near the wrist. My fear was that it had migrated or actually caused a fracture once the bird started trying to use the wing. This time, we had more of the left side of the body in the initial x-ray, and vet tech Autumn Parker and I noticed what looked like more lead, so we did a full-body x-ray and discovered the poor bird had not one but SIX pellets lodged throughout his body. ​The full-body x-ray also showed numerous old, healed injuries; this bird’s had a rough life.

Don’t even get me started on what I think of anyone who’d shoot a red-tail—or any other bird, for that matter—deliberately, but our best guess is he might’ve been flying over a dove field near the end of dove season and flew into a hail of pellets as hunters were shooting at doves. It wouldn’t be the first time a raptor was hit while flying over a dove field, as hunting doves isn’t a precise “sport” (and I use the term loosely and with no little sarcasm)—it’s more “spray and pray.”
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At any rate, Jim agreed that the wing pellet shouldn’t be interfering with flight unless it had severed a tendon or ligament, which wouldn’t show on an x-ray, or was pressing on a nerve—again, not visible on an x-ray. We briefly discussed the possibility of surgery to remove the pellet to see if it would help; we’re keeping that on the table as an option.

​Meanwhile, the red-tail is back inside so the barred owl from last week can get some flight conditioning prior to his release. He’s, well, not a happy camper, but a less-peeved one now that he’s in the raptor flight. Below is an example of what a frustrated raptor can do to his box.

​He’s slated for release later this week.

The flyers are as adorable as ever and start getting active just before sunset; the remainder of the night, they bounce all over their enclosure. Come sunrise, they’re shut up tightly in their nest box, and I don’t see them all day long. I often hear people say they’d love to have flyers as pets. Aside from the fact that it’s illegal to have wildlife as “pets”, no nocturnal animal makes a good pet unless you also sleep all day and are up all night. Flyers are cute as they can be, but they’re wild animals and deserve the chance to live their lives as nature intended. These young ones are overwintering at LWR because flyers remain with their mothers until they’re 20 weeks old; for these babies that would be approximately the end of December—not a good time to release inexperienced young animals, as there’s little food available that time of year and they have no supplies laid up for the winter. Also, young flyers usually overwinter with their mothers, so that’s another factor that keeps them at LWR through the winter.
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Every decision we make concerning food, housing, overwintering, release, medical treatment, etc., is made with the best interest of the wildlife in mind. The goal is to give each animal the best chance at survival after release, and we take that very seriously.