Starting with the eagle, of course, he was a 7lb., 3oz. adult bird who came from Emmanuel County. He’d been down a while, as his tail feathers were stained about halfway up and the edges were ragged. He arrived in respiratory distress, so I quickly called Auburn before even notifying my vets at Smalley’s that I was en route with an eagle. The folks at Auburn said get him on oxygen as soon as I got to my vet clinic, so the next call was to Smalley’s as I headed out the door.
Back into the box and on oxygen he went until he stabilized. Jim and I agreed the right lung looked cloudy on the x-ray, although the Auburn vet said he could tell little from it, as we snapped only the one, very quickly, before getting the bird back on oxygen.
His breathing was quieter and seemed less labored the next morning, although he wasn’t standing as he had been on the previous day. I placed him in a donut to ease his breathing even more, since he wasn’t standing. He remained alert and readily snatched food from the forceps. I again consulted Auburn, and they recommended against transport, given that he’d gone from standing to needing a donut overnight. They also approved my plan to provide small feedings every two hours.
At some point between his 3PM and 5PM feedings he died. As I’d also been in constant contact with Bob Sargent, head of Georgia DNR’s eagle program, I alerted him to the bird’s death and he asked that the carcass be kept cool until he could send a game tech to retrieve it the next morning.
As of Friday morning, the carcass was en route to Athens for a necropsy, as we all want to know what killed the eagle.
In better news, we did have three releases: the great horned owl, the barred owl and the sharpie. I only managed to get video of the great horned’s release.
With a solid week of clear skies and mostly mild temps, the vultures have been making themselves scarce, so no photos of them this week.