Help! Volunteers are needed! Avian Botulism has struck again, and thousands of migratory waterfowl and shorebirds are sick and dying! Beginning on September 3rd Bird Ally X Botulism Response has been treating over 50 new patients each day.
As of September 10, 356 sick birds have been admitted to our field hospital on the Lower Klamath Wildlife Refuge just south of Klamath Falls.
Staffing is very short right now and we desperately need help.
Volunteers are needed to assist with many tasks, housekeeping, feeding, helping with exams and more. You will be given the training you need to complete each task.
It is difficult but highly rewarding work! Bird Ally X is a leader in botulism response and you are needed on our team!
Local volunteers are especially needed as our ability to house crew members is limited.
Avian botulism is caused by environmental conditions that allow the toxin to bloom. High temperatures combined with dry weather lead to fish die-offs, which leads to a sudden explosion of the toxin in the environment. Aquatic invertebrates who feed on the dead fish are in turn eaten by waterfowl and shorebirds. The toxin causes paralysis and death. Treatment works! Capturing sick birds and bringing them into care has a very high success rate. In 2020, the last time a major outbreak occurred, over 3000 birds were treated and released.
Want to be a hero? Easy, just put on your cape and come help out!
Can’t help in the field? Then please help with your donation! This is a problem you can absolutely throw money at!!!
A Beechcraft Bonanza is not as stylish or formidable as a Bald Eagle, but still it was with a certain amount of panache that the two-tone brown, trim and speedy plane touched down on the runway of the California Redwood Coast- Humboldt County Airport the early afternoon of August 7. Since the aircraft was bearing precious cargo in the form of one very important Humbodt County resident, a male Bald Eagle who resides with us here on Humboldt Bay, quoting Neil Armstrong to mark the occasion of his happy return home was only natural, perhaps even required: The Eagle Has Landed.
The Eagle is landing at the airport in Humboldt County…
The neat little plane, owned by Eric and Cindi Choate, was flown by Eric and carried, besides the Bald Eagle, Cindi, and Luis “Lou” Rivas of Flying Tails, an animal rescue organization founded by San Francisco Bay area news anchor and private pilot, Ken Wayne. Flying Tails has a remarkable list of achievements over the years, flying animals in need of help or rescue all around the state. Flying Tails has gotten many wildlife rehabilitation patients into care and released back to the wild.
As it happens, Mr Wayne’s plane was being serviced on the day of the Eagle flight, so Lou was able to secure a ride with his friend, Eric, who also happens to be a Civil Air Patrol volunteer.
Not the aircraft in question, but it was just like this one…. a real cutie-pie!
On the first of July is when this Eagle’s story in care begins. As so often happens in our work, it began with a phone call to Humboldt Wildlife Care Center/bird ally x. The caller was reporting that a Bald Eagle appeared to be injured in their driveway. The Eagle had been there all morning and they had seen blood on one of their wings.
We launched a crew to investigate. I took one of our seasonal rehabilitation techs, Na’Mae Gray, with me to help with the rescue as well as learn the techniques of injured raptor capture. I wasn’t convinced yet that we were going to find an Eagle. Eagle calls are much more less common than false alarm Eagle calls. Every wildlife rehabilitator can you tell about the time a caller brought them what they said was a Bald Eagle baby who turned out to be a nestling Pigeon.
But in fact the injured bird was indeed an adult Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)! And while he couldn’t fly, he could run like the dickens. Around the ferns in the forest above Cal Poly I chased the Eagle with Na’Mae blocking possible escape routes. Shortly I caught the wise and wily bird in my long handled net – soon he was in our crate to be transported back to our clinic in Manila. (Remember we are at a new location: 68 Mill St in Manila!)
In our exam room, HWCC staff rehabilitator Ash Shields got a chance to help with their first Bald Eagle admission examination. Although my first time was nearly 25 years ago in Seattle, I can still remember the thrill and anxiousness of holding a Bald Eagle in my hands the first time. I mean I can remember the thrill from my first time seeing a Bald Eagle in the wild (near Shasta). I knew that Ash was probably feeling a complicated mix of excitement, fear and responsibility. “I was nervous,” they said, “but in awe of the strength this eagle had, and how powerful of a bird they are!”
During the exam, we found nothing really major wrong with him. We did note his slightly smaller stature, which we took to mean that this bird is a male. He was in decent body condition. There was some bleeding from a couple of his primary feathers, but no fractures. Still, a grounded Eagle has no future – dehydration and then starvation would claim him without our intervention. It seemed like the most he would need was food and time in an aviary recovering his ability to fly. The people who found him said he’d had a fish with him they first discovered him. We conjectured that he’d tangled with an Osprey over that fish and that the Osprey had managed to get their own licks in, even though they’d lost the fish. It’s a tough old world.
Opening our transport crate to get the Eagle out for his admission examination.Ash Shields, holding a Bald Eagle for the first time, is an asset to our field. Yes, that’s a halo above their head.Palpating the shoulders for injuries, swelling or anything that might explain the matter. It takes the three of us, – Ash, myself and those are Na’Mae Gray’s hands helping keep the Eagle still by holding his head and right wing.The Eagle is in pretty good shape overall.
Needing aviary time, however simple a treatment plan, still presented us with a problem. Our eagle aviary was lost in our move from Bayside to Manila and we haven’t yet rebuilt it. (want to help rebuild our raptor aviary? donate here!) Sure, with your help we’ve rebuilt a lot in the last 18 months, but we still have a lot more to do! And this bird didn’t have time to wait for the end of our hectic wild baby season – no doubt he had his own baby season he needed to get back to. His partner was now a single parent.
Fortunately, just a four-hour drive South, is Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue. Their executive director, Doris Duncan, and I have know each other for nearly twenty years. At SCWR they treat thousands of wild patients each year, as well as maintain impressive programs to promote co-existence with our wild neighbors for rural, agricultural, suburban and urban areas. I reached out to Doris and she readily agreed to help us with this Eagle. The next day Bird Ally X co-founder and chief photographer administrator and general utility player, Laura Corsiglia and Ash took the drive to Petaluma and SCWR to deliver one Bald Eagle in need of an aviary and some quality care.
On site at Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue.SCWR is a beautiful facility. HWCC is working hard to finish building our capacity in order to meet the needs of our patients.
Doris Duncan of SCWR is a fantastic resource for wildlife rehabilitation, and she’s an excellent advocate for our profession. With her organization, she has also supported our work here in Humboldt County helping us when we were building and expanding our capacity at the old Bayside site.
After about 4 weeks, she texted me that the Eagle was ready for release. It was thrilling news! We started to arrange a team (probably Laura and one of our staff) to drive down to Petaluma to get him!
I texted Doris that we were ready to travel, but she replied, “No need! Flying Tails will bring your Eagle home!”
And there we were, on the 7 of August, at the airport, waiting for the Eagle to land. Our release site would be a field very close to the capture site, not 300 yards away, which happened to be at the home of one our board members, Lisken Rossi, as well as her parents (and HWCC supporters), Gail and Tony.
(l-r) Laura, Ash, Na’mae, waiting for our ship to come in at the airport with a very long name, in one of the very few pictures not taken by Laura.Lou, of Flying Tails (foreground) and the pilot Eric bring the Bald Eagle out from the hangar where they’ve left the lovely little Beechcraft.Cindi Choate and Na’mae leave restricted areas in pursuit of the Eagle’s return to freedomThe ground crew meets the air crew!At the release site, Ash and Na’mae carry the crate to the field of the Eagle’s dreams.Na’Mae waits for the Eagle to emerge!And suddenly he decides to fly!The Eagle left the crate and flew out of the field and about 60 feet up into a nearby Redwood, where he reclaimed his mastery of all he surveyed!Happy staff! Alondra Cardena, Ash and Na’Mae enjoy the successful release!Alondra shares her video of the Eagle leaving the crate with Ash and Na’Mae – and they make a fine staff group photo at the same time! Below is the video Alondra shot.
This Bald Eagle’s rescue was very much a group effort. The concerned callers who originally found the injured Eagle, HWCC/bax, Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue and Ken Wayne’s Flying Tails all worked together to give this beloved member of the Humboldt Bay community a second chance.
Of course, we are very committed to being able to provide quality care here in our region for all the wild patients we serve, so that means we need your help continuing to rebuild our capacity after our swiftly done relocation last year. So far, with your help we’ve been able to make great strides in building back our capacity and expanding it over what we had lost! Our new yard for orphaned fawns is a perfect example of our improved facility, made possible with your support. Our new waterfowl aviary is as well. A raptor aviary is next on the list. With your help we’ll soon get it done! Thank you for making our work possible!
It was the evening of March 31 that we were having a class on hatchling and nestling care for our staff and volunteers. Part of the material in the class was the approximate dates that we tend to start admitting certain species. Roughly, we had until the last few days of April, most years, before Mallard ducklings would begin to emerge. Nestling and fledgling songbirds start coming in about two weeks later.
As an aside to that, we talked about things that we would prioritize to complete in the next few weeks in preparation for the season before all of our time would be taken up by patient care.
The season had other plans. Three days later, April 2, our first hatchling ducks started to come in.
I often tell staff that the two gods I pray to are Necessity and Dumb Luck. I love them both. Necessity tells me what’s next and Dumb Luck helps make it happen sometimes, maybe, you can hope. Necessity said next up is a duckling pond for baby ducks old enough to be housed outside but who still need the heat support that would have been provided by their mother. Necessity also gave us a week to build it.
The part needed that isn’t Necessity or Dumb Luck is no god. That’s where each of us comes in. Elbow grease. Commitment. Community support. By the end of April we finished putting up a waterfowl aviary and adjacent smaller duckling pond, our first since moving to Manila in March of 2023. Maybe what I mean by Dumb Luck is the aspect of our work that requires us to believe that what is necessary will be done, because it must be done. In hindsight, after the accomplishment, one feels enormous gratitude, and also very lucky.
As it happened, the season just got busier and busier from April 2 on – by the end of the week, were getting very tiny Virginia Opossum babies whose mothers had been killed by cars or dogs. By April 11 we had tiny raccoon babies, who had been taken from their mother when their den was uprooted during some “brush removal” in Del Norte County, 80 miles north of us. With neonatal mammals, the feedings are as close to around the clock as we can manage – an inescapable part of parenting, as every parent knows – that we recreate as best as we are able.
So here we are, just past the midway point of the Season of wild orphans – we’ve been working 14 hour days for more than three months now. We still have about two months to go. The fact that we’ve even made it his far is in every way because of your support. Support that stays critical. We still have so much more to come this Season, and we still have a lot to complete to bring our facility back to its proper capacity. Your help is going to keep being needed, hopefully forever. If you can please donate to keep our season going, our doors open, our utilities paid, our food delivered, our medicines covered – our needs met. We do a lot on a little – we can do even more on more. Thank you!!!
Please take a look at our slide show of photographs from what so far has been, it cannot be denied, a WILD WILD BABY SEASON.
Our duckling pond and waterfowl aviary were completed just in time for the 30 Mallards and 6 Gadwalls we’ve treated so far this year! These Mallards are being released into the same lake where we gatherd the duckweed we offered them while in care.
We treated 11 Canada goslings this year! Each baby is big!!
Mid-May we admitted a Pigeon Guillemot who had derelict fishing line tangled around their body. After removing the line providing some time in our new seabird pool, we took them back to Trinidad to resume the baby season, no doubt an important member of the baby feeding team.
Every now and again we admit Western Spotted Skunks! These young skunks were found in Del Norte County and through a series of volunteer drivers, were transported to our clinic on Humboldt Bay. We had them in care for a month until they were ready to face the wild on their own. We took them back to Crescent City.
After a month in care these orphaned Western Spotted Skunks were released near the location they had been originally found.
Re-uniting fledgling songbirds with their families is one of our important tasks all Season long. This Cedar Waxwing fledgling was soon the object of great concern when we brought the young bird back to their nest’s location. Adult Waxwings immediately took charge of the situation.
An adult Cedar Waxwing watches with great interest when weput a Waxwing fledgling we believe is their baby back where the rescuer found them.
Soon after realizing their baby was back, the parents immediately began to offer food!
There is no joy like the joy of reuniting families.
A juvenile Steller’s Jay is released back into the Community Forest where they were found as a nestling on the ground. All corvids are challenging patients in the same way as all gifted and talented children. This Jay was no different – bold, bright and curious!
Every year we provide care for a few to half a dozen orphaned Gray Fox kits. They eat a lot of rats! Frozen rats cost anywhere from two to four dollars each. When the kits are eating 6 a day, that adds up fast!
Two brother foxes, who came in when they were still fluffballs with their eyes only recently opened, were released in Mid-July.
Foxes are amazing animals. They climb like cats, look like dogs, and bark and hiss and scream. Once while we were picking these guys up to do a routine examination, a wild and free adult Gray Fox came near our outdoor fox housing to see what was the matter. Thanks to your suppoort we were able to provide them their needs while they learned to hunt and care for themselves.
A Red-shouldered hawk, no doubt with a nest and parental duties, was struck by a car on 299, near North Bank Rd. Amazingly the raptor had no injuries! After a day of observation, we returned the hawk to their neighborhood along the Batowat just north of Arcata.
We’ve treated over half a dozen Brown Pelicans, in a small mirror of the pelican mortality event that occurred in much greater numbers further South, from the Bay area to San Diego. This juvenile Pelican came in emaciated and very cold. Once stable and ready to be housed outdoors, we converted our recently completed waterfowl aviary to meet the needs of a recovering Pelican. After three weeks of rest and plenty of fish, the big young bird was ready to return to Humbold Bay and beyond. The photos that follow are the in sequence of his release on the Samoa Penminsula.
A month ago, a biologist working out past Willow Creek found a Trukey Vulture baby on the ground in the forest. We’ve had the bird in care for a month now, and let’s just say it takes a lot of carrion to make a grown up Turkey vulture! For a short time, we were able to house this baby with an adult Turkey vulture. The arrangement seemed to work out for both of them.
An adult Turkey Vulture was found by the side of the road in Fortuna. When our staff arrived on the scene, the bird was very lethargic, barely able to move. Several times over the first few days of care, it seemed they were about to die. But with fluids, nutrition and rest, soon the vulture was awake and alert. Within a week they were strong enough to feed themself. After three weeks, they were ready for the open sky!
We took the Vulture back to Fortuna and released them by the banks of the Eel River.
Every once in a while we get a call about a Bald Eagle in trouble. Even less frequently, the animal in trouble actually is an eagle! Grounded, with minor injuries in the woods just east of Arcata, we beleive this adult, presumably male Bald Eagle had tangled with an Osprey over the rightful ownership of some fish.
Staff member Ash Shields, in the moment when they are holding an injured eagle for an exam for the first time in their life. The occasion is momentous.
The chance to examine any wild patient is also a chance to teach and to learn. Every patient has something to teach us. This Bald Eagle was no different.
Because our facility isn’t finished being rebuilt after our move last year, we transferred the Eagle to Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue for further recuperation in their large aviary. When the handsome fellow is ready for release, he will come back to Humboldt. Members of Arcata’s dedicated birding community have reached out to us, hoping to be reassured about the his prognosis. While nothing is certain until release, we beleive that this Eagle has a very excellent chance of soaring again soon over Humboldt Bay. Meanwhile, we are hoping to begin building a new large aviary here by the end of Summer. Your help will make that possible!
We really need your help to keep going this Summer. We still have 2 months or more left of the Season and several hundred animals to admit. Please help us help our wild neighbiors in need! Thank you so much!!!!
It’s been a very busy wild baby season, even as we continue to rebuild our facility a year after moving to Manila. Your help is critical to our success. Please donate!
Your donation supports everything we do! From rescue of injured and orphaned wildlife, to keeping wild families together, to developing and training the next generation of wildlife care providers. So far 2024 is one of our most demanding years of our history with nearly a thousand patients already treated since January. There is so much more to do and we need your help to make it all happen.
Since 1979, HWCC has tried to provide excellent care for our region’s orphaned Mule Deer fawns. This year, thanks to your support and our volunteers’ efforts, including an incredibel work day put in by local members of the US Coast Guard! Watch the video for our report on our progress!
We have more to go, more to build to regain our lost capacity after last year’s move. Your support will make it all happen. Please help us help our wild neighbors!! Thank you!!!
At Humboldt Wildlife Care Center/bird ally x we are committed to helping develop the next generation of wildlife care proividers. It’s an intergral part of our mission. Your continued support is what will make it possible!
Season’s Greetings! It’s hard to believe we’ve made it another year! After moving all of our operations to our undeveloped new property in March, the challenges were looming. The prospect of treating the 800 or so wild babies we admit each year in a completely unprepared facility was daunting. With your support however, we quickly got a workable pool for seabird orphans, an aviary for songbirds, other outdoor housing that we made work for everyone from Mallard ducklings to Pelicans and even a Gray Squirrel!
In the end, it was a season full of joys and successes! We treated and released dozens of baby Swallows – Barn Swallows, Cliff Swallows and Violet-Green Swallows – and we treated nearly 200 orphaned Opossum babies! 13 Raccoons! Over a dozen Striped Skunk kits and over a dozen Mallard ducklings too! We brought safe and humane resolutions to dozens of human-wildlife conflicts, keeping wild families together and protecting people’s homes! We even managed to take in the deer fawns from the Redding/Shasta area when the facility there became unavailable.
Ahead, in the Winter months, we’ll rebuild more of our capacity. We have support from the Oiled Wildlife Care Network to build three large seabird pools, we’ll soon finish the raccoon housing we started this Summer – an aviary for ducks, geese and herons will be started soon… Funding issues are forever – we’ll ask for your help again and again. Our community’s support has been awesome. Without you 2023 would’ve been a disaster! Instead it was the first year in our bold new era of independence and sustainability! Thank you!
As we enter the Winter months, with a to-do list that is exciting and challenging, we’ll continue to build a wildlife care facility that is as good as our Wild Neighbors deserve. I hope that 2024 brings all of us, near and far, the peace and prosperity that will help get the hard work done. Thank you for your support across the year, and the ages.
You make it all possible! May you have a joyful Holiday Season and a Happy New Year!
With deep gratitude Monte Merrick, director HWCC/bax
