Bored and socially distant? Hie you to the nearest body of water and start picking up discarded and derelict fishing gear! The life you save will probably be Wild.

Posted on May 17, 2020May 17, 2020 by Monte Merrick

Fish hooks and fishing line cause uncountable wildlife injuries. The toll fishing gear takes on marine birds, reptiles, and mammals (not to mention the targeted species!) numbers in the thousands along the California coast alone each year. (see study here) According to the Humane Society of the United States (link here) over a million marine animals are killed each year by “longline” fishing at sea.

From “ghost nets” that sweep silently through the sea, lost from their vessel, killing whales, dolphins, sea turtles, seabirds, fish and more, to wads of monofilament line that litter the shores of rivers and lakes ensnaring chickadees and egrets, this pollution problem is a source of untold, unknowable suffering for our wild neighbors.

In the last 8 years we’ve treated nearly 200 animals at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center/bax who’ve been injured or entangled by discarded fishing gear. We have no idea how many, locally, are injured and never rescued, but that number is significantly higher than the relatively lucky few who are found and treated.

Sadly in the last week we’ve had three patients entangled in fishing line with hook injuries – a Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias), and two Western Gulls (Larus occidentalis).

In the case of the heron, we received a call in the late morning that one of these unmistakable large birds was struggling on the bank of the Mad River where it flows through Blue Lake, a few miles inland from Humboldt Bay. When staff arrived on the scene, they found the heron, entangled in line.

*The rescued is heron is taken back to the vehicle.*

Fortunately, the injuries the heron suffered were minimal, within a few days the bold and pointed argument he made was let me out of here or somebody gets it. Other than imminent death by entaglement, there was nothing at all wrong – a very strong, large, and healthy individual – it would have been a tragedy no matter who suffers, but for such a remarkably successful individual to perish from something that violates the universal contract – the laws of natural selection, fitness, and adaptability – seems especially cruel – just as when a magnificently healthy songbird is brought to us with fatal injuries from a car or a cat. Fishing line, hooks, lures, nets, etc, are not agents of evolution, targeting the least fit among us – they are simply an injustice – a thoughtless or callous disregard.

After several days we took the rightfully indignant truly Great Blue Heron back to the Mad River, and wild freedom.

HWCC/bax Assistant Rehab Manager Lucinda Adamson and staff member Desiree Vang remove hook and line form Great Blue Heron – watch to see the Heron’s release!

Soon after releasing the heron, HWCC received an early morning message from Shelter Cove, nearly two hours south of our clinic by car. A gull was dangling by fishing line from a bluff above Black Sands beach. At first we tried to find someone closer to the scene who could help, but the current pandemic has reduced available resources… So we launched staff on resuce mission. When our staff reached the gull, the bird was dead, hanging from line.

Photograph texted to HWCC/bax in the early morning hours of a gull entangled in fishing line at Black Sands Beach in Shelter Cove.

*ex-HWCC/bax intern and generally awesome climber and animal care giver Savannah Shore scrambles up the bluff to retrieve the bird.*

*The gull had been ensnared in this old gear.*

take a moment

A few days before the gull died on that bluff, we admitted another hooked and entangled Western Gull, this bird found in Field’s Landing, right on Humboldt Bay. Unfortunately he had swallowed a hook. He was spitting up blood around a long piece of filament that reached further down his throat than we could see. This gull would need a wildlife surgeon.

We reached out to Bird Ally X co-founder and skilled wildlife veterinarian, Dr. Shannon Riggs, in Morro Bay where she is the Director of Animal Services for Pacific Wildlife Care. (listen to a conversation with Dr Riggs on our podcast) Shannon agreed to treat the bird and long relay (with awkward social distancing) was set up for transport. Jen Martin, an HWCC/bax intern who is not able to come to the clinic for shifts currently due to the pandemic, drove the gull down to Native Songbird Care and Conservation (NSCC) in Sebastopol, near Santa Rosa. BAX co-founder Marie Travers, volunteers at NSCC occasionally and was able to be there to receive the gull. Marie transported the gull to the Salinas area, where a Pacific Wildlife Care volunteer met her to take the bird on the last leg of the journey.

*Radiographs of the gull with hook lodge in esophagus. Can you spot the offending piece of barbed metal?*

The day after the gull arrived in Morro Bay (May 6, which as we all know is the anniversary of the day Henry Thoreau died of tuberculosis at the age of 44), Dr Riggs texted me the pictures of the radiographs she had made of the hook’s location. She added this comment to the images: “Well, it’s not in the worst place possible, but pretty damned close. Will try to get it tomorrow, but not very optimistic.”

A good ‘doc’ doesn’t deliver false hope or promises and Shannon is a very good doctor. I’ve worked with her since 2007 and I trust her completely – I replied: Good Luck! – confident that the bird was in the best hands possible.

The hook that was caught in the gull’s esophagus

The next day we learned that the surgery was successful and that the gull was recovering well. Getting the above pictures, of the hook and the standing gull, post-op, were wonderful moments in a day of animal care, with losses, exhaustion, grief and joy. No animal still in captive care is out of the woods yet, so cautiously we celebrate his recovery. Soon we’ll be coordinating the trip back north so the gull can return to his home on Humboldt Bay, free and ready again for the wild challenges.

*While at the release site for the Great Blue Heron above, this crap was picked up and brought back to the clinic by HCC/bax staff.*

Everywhere that people go, fishing hooks and line are sure to follow. With our non-essential business on stand-still in many places, wouldn’t this be a good time to assign yourself some essential work? Namely, helping to clean this junk out of our local environs. It’s literally everywhere. If you go to beach, the river, a lake, a bay, a slough – carry a trash bag with you and pick up what others have left behind. You may never learn of the tragedy that you’ve averted, but every scrap removed from the environment is a scrap that won’t kill an innocent victim.

None of our work would happen as well as it does, with as many successes as we have, without your support. I say this all the time, because it true. Your generosity makes everything possible for wildlife care in our region, our state, and our world. Thank you.

DONATE TODAY TO HELP RESCUE ORPHANED AND INJURED WILD NEIGHBORS

After Being Ensnared by Derelict Fishing Gear, a Young Gull’s Second Chance.

Posted on October 6, 2018October 7, 2018 by Monte Merrick

Over the Fall and Winter months, as young gulls disperse from the rocky shorelines where they were raised and develop into mature gulls who by simple circumstance learn to use the unnatural resources that human cities and towns provide, at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, we see a dramatic rise in gulls admitted for care – from birds that have been hit by cars somewhere along US101 as it delivers a steady stream, thousands daily, of cars and trucks close to Eureka’s gull-rich waterfront, to gulls found poisoned by rodenticide and other toxins and, of course, the common killer of so many marine and terrestrial wild animals, derelict fishing gear.

From the the drifting and sunken ghost nets and traps of the open sea to the tangles of mono-filament that cling to the branches of trees along nearly ever river in the land, derelict fishing gear kills an unknowably large number of animals. While the numbers of animals killed around the world by derelict fishing gear may never be known, we can measure the money lost when a “fishery” is impacted, and we can know that, as an example, their are over 85,000 lost lobster and crab traps ghost-fishing right now in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

[We interrupt this story to remind you that we are currently in the busiest year of HWCC history, with nearly a thousand patients, from Barn Owls to Raccoons, already treated. This is the most financially challenging year of our existence and we need your help. Please donate today! Thank you!! ]

In a world so polluted it makes sense that we routinely admit patients who’ve been ensnared in derelect fishing gear.

At the end of last week, just as staff was completing tasks and closing for the day, we received a call from the person working at the Interpretive Center at the Arcata Marsh. A gull entangled in fishing line was stuck on an island in the middle of Klopp Lake, the last big pond at the Marsh. Accessible only by boat, clinic staff got permission from the Arcata Environmental Services Office to put a boat in the lake. We are careful to get permission for rescues such as these – the people of Arcata enjoy the marsh and protect it. With permission, now if someone who saw our team paddling out to an island to “harass” wildlife reported us to the city, the city would already know.

Our clinic staff that day, Stephanie Owens, wildlife rehabilitator and Ruth Mock, volunteer coordinator, then sprang into action. Here’s Ruth’s description

“Stephanie and I drove to her house and stopped by to grab [Stephanie’s partner] Damian, from his work on the way. We loaded three kayaks up on two cars and deployed to the marsh. We were able to quickly get to the middle island and find the gull. Damian stayed in a kayak to block any attempt for the gull to flee into the water and to start cutting the lines that he was caught in. Stephanie and I cut off what we could just to free him and found a hook through his feathers. It wouldn’t budge. We got him boxed and sent him off with Damian to get him secured and calm in the car while we quickly removed the remaining line to prevent other entrapments from happening. On the exam table, we saw that the hook was a treble hook and was entangled in the shafts of the feathers only.”

HWCC/bax staff rehabilitator, Stephanie Owens at the scene of the rescue.

Our latest wildlife rescuing recruit, Damian, ferries the gull back to the mainland.

Part of what was removed – a ‘cute’ little device with it’s ghost fishing days now behind it.

The young Western Gull (Larus occidentalis) was in fairly good shape. Neither the fishing line nor the hooks had caused any significant injury. Constriction wounds caused by tightly wound fishing line, not mention the damage hooks can do, especially when swallowed, can make these cases especially heartbreaking. The gull did have several deep cuts, or lacerations, on the top of his head, which we cleaned and closed. These cuts were possibly caused by other gulls, who were reported to be pecking at him while he was trapped.

After a day inside, the gull was moved to our specially-built gull aviary (we also house Pelicans and Cormorants in this aviary, when necessary. We call it the PGC Aviary)

After five days in care, the gulls wounds on his head were healing well, and his weight had climbed to a healthier number. His flight, which had been impaired only by his initial exhaustion, was in excellent form. It was time for him to return to HUmboldt Bay and wild freedom.

Released at the Arcata Marsh, the young bird wastes no time getting out of the box.

Just a short stroll…

…to his favorite watering hole

And then goodbye…

Another gull, wild and free, with a second chance…

Over the last 7 years, BAX has worked hard to build HWCC into a facility for the injured and orphaned wildlife of our region that could provide high quality care as well as be a place to develop and train future wildlife rehabilitators for the enormous challenges, environmental and societal, that everyone, including our wild neighbors, will be facing in the coming decades. We’ve come a long way on very little. Our staff is currently the best we’ve ever had and our facility is able to meet the needs of almost all of our patients, but we still have a lot of work to do! Without your support none of our new capacity would have been possible, and without ongoing support, we won’t be able to sustain what we have, let alone improve on our work.

This gull is the recipient of our last 7 years of work. His second chance was provided by the skilled team that your support ensures is here, at the ready. Thank you for keeping our work alive! Thank you for your support. Please donate today.

all photos: Bird Ally X

Aquatic Birds in Care

Posted on November 21, 2016November 21, 2016 by Monte Merrick

Every year, as our busy wild baby season comes to a close, aquatic birds, who breed elsewhere, come back to the Pacific Coast to overwinter. The famed Aleutian Cackling Geese, Brant, Grebes, Loons, seaducks, dabbling ducks, all use our relatively mild winters with historically food-rich waters to while away the hibernal months.

At Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, the arrival of wintering aquatic birds means a dramatic change in our caseload. Already this Autumn we have provided care for dozens of adult and juvenile aquatic birds.

For adult birds, this season is a time of comparative ease, without the responsibilities of rearing young. For this year’s young, this is their first season in the world of adults, a time of learning – learning to hunt, where to find food, learning their way around the real world, becoming independent.

The real world naturally holds threats – not every juvenile bird lives. Adults die in storms. They are caught by predators. Old age takes its toll as well. Still, it’s rare that we admit patients suffering from these natural calamities and processes.

Most patients are admitted in poor body condition – emaciated, anemic and dehydrated – obviously suffering from starvation.

This year, the usually “productive” California Current is not providing the quantity of fish needed to support the wintering population. As we noted earlier in the year, Common Murres, who raise their young on the North Coast experienced complete colony failure this year due to the absence of appropriate prey fish. (Even at our clinic we are struggling to stay in supply of food to feed our patients, due to this shortage!)

There are other causes of injury. Some of our patients this season were entangled in derelict fishing gear, and no doubt we will treat more. Derelict fishing gear is a global problem that makes itself known locally everywhere.

Typically each year we treat waterfowl, geese and ducks, that have been legally shot by hunters, but not killed, that have been found later by someone else. And sometimes we admit aquatic birds with traumatic injuries that we can’t ascribe to any particular cause – wing fractures, leg fractures that may be from collisions with human infrastructure, boats, battering surf – we just don’t know.

In all cases, however, our trained staff and purpose-built facilities allow us to provide excellent care for aquatic birds – noe of which would be possible without your generous support. So as we continue through this season, scroll the photos below to see some of our recent and current patients. And get out and enjoy our wintering wild aquatic neighbors! And as usual, if you can help us meet our mission with financial support, please do! We need you!

Northern Shoveler (Anas clypeata)in care, moments before her release evaluation, demonstrating that explosive flight is well within her capabilities.

Female Northern Shoveler during her release evaluation exam

Northern Shoveler wing, extended for examination. Note her delicate blue and green speculum.
Northern Shoveler flies free!

Western Grebe (Aechmophorus occidentalis) feet! Very awkward on land, in the water, these feet become propellers, as the bird swiftly pursues fish for her meals.
Western Grebe wing.
Each bird receives nutritional support, is treated for parasites and given supplemental vitamins while in care.

Like many aquatic bird species, Western grebes are social and seek the comfort and safety of a like-minded community.
Even a Pacific Loon (Gavia pacifica) can be part of the gang!

Surf Scoter (Melanitta perspicillata) being released after two weeks in care, regaining lost body weight and strength.

Another Western Grebe released.
This Belted Kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon) collided with a building suffering very little injury. Still this male needed a few days to recover. Upon release in his home territory at Big Lagoon he immediately circled around calling and joined a female, his likely mate.

An incredible moment as the Kingfisher flew a circle around his caregivers immediately after release.

Belted Kingfishers, like all aquatic birds, require specialized care. Bird Ally X was founded as a means to bring quality aquatic bird care to the more remote areas of our coast where experience and resources are scant. This male’s care and release at Big Lagoon is a testament to that mission.
In an awesome update to a recent story, this Pacific Loon, who was found by HWCC staff on the beach in Samoa entangled in a discarded fishing net, was just released today!
Releasing any patient is an immeasurable reward, but in another way we have a direct measure – your support. This Loon’s second chance was bought and paid for by your donation! Thank you!

Your support for our work during every season is critical. We have nearly a dozen aquatic birds in care right now, in addition to our other patients. We anticipate more to come. Each month brings us new challenges – some predictable, like the return of wintering seabirds, others less predictable, such as failing prey fish populations, sudden storms, and other emergencies. Being able to rely on you allows us to prepare for both. Your donation (click here) to help us meet our November goal of $7000 will go directly to the care of these remarkable birds who live so near to us, but whose lives are so different. Thank you!!!

Brown Pelican Snared In Fishing Line Healed? Why, yes!

Posted on August 10, 2014 by Monte Merrick

Please help our fundraising drive for the month of August. Our goal: $5000 by the end of the month! Every donation gets us closer. Thank you!!!

A juvenile Brown Pelican, caught in fishing line, stranded – a sadly common story. All over the world, all over the country, all over California and here on the North Coast, derelict fishing gear, open bins of fish waste, poor angler practices, and more contribute to an environment with more hazards than ever for these iconic, magnificent birds.

Humboldt Wildlife Care Center/Bird Ally X has the expertise and the facility to provide the specialized care these birds require – and these are not easy resources to come by. Years of experience, and a lot of effort go into acquiring skills and the infrastructure to provide excellent care. Yet even with these, still we aren’t complete. We need you. Your support – moral, physical and financial – makes our work rescuing, rehabilitating and releasing injured and orphaned wild animals possible. You make it happen!

Found on the beach in Crescent City, she suffered from abrasions caused by fishing line wrapped around both wings. She also had a nasty constriction wound where the line had wrapped tightly around her left leg.

She also was severely thin, starving because she was unable to eat. Brown pelicans plunge dive from as high as 75 feet into the cold ocean. A remarkable feat that requires top form… soon this young bird would have died without rescue…

Constriction wounds can be very tricky. With circulation cut off, tissue on the far side of the embedded line can die, leading to complete loss of her foot. A Brown Pelican needs both feet to thrive. Fortunately, we got to her in time, removed the line and her foot survived.

To keep track of each patient we give them temporary colored leg bands. This young pelican was given a yellow band, and written on the band, the word YES. Her code for the duration of her care? Y for yellow followed by YES, or Y-YES!

It took nearly a month for her wounds to heal and her weight to climb back into a healthy range. When she finally was ready to go, man did she!

Check out her release photos below. And remember, it was your support that gave her a second chance! Thank you!

Donate

All photographs Laura Corsiglia/BAX

Belted Kingfisher Says Every Day is Earth Day

Posted on April 23, 2014 by Monte Merrick

(Video of release at bottom of story!)

Last Sunday, while kids scrambled for eggs, others headed to Redwood Park, and birders ventured out across the county and beyond as a part of Godwit Days, Humboldt’s annual birding festival, along the west bank of the Mad River just up from the hatchery, a Belted Kingfisher struggled at the end of a long strand of fishing line. The line was entangled in overhanging branches and the bird, a female, presumably preparing with her partner for the season of rearing young, was suspended above the river, the line wrapped around the flight feathers of her left wing.

A young man, Brian, had been walking along the bank – it was a warm, bright day – and saw her struggling. There was no one else around. He called Humboldt Wildlife Care Center. He offered to wait for our rescue team to arrive on scene to show us exactly her location.

It’s a terrible thing to see a bird snared in fishing line, struggling to get free, nowhere to stand. Serious injury seems certain and quite possibly life threatening. Brian saved this kingfisher’s life. If he hadn’t seen her or hadn’t called, a long, suffering death awaited her, all due to fishing line lost into the wild and forgotten.

During her exam, the kingfisher was clearly dehydrated, as her “squinty-eyes” attest.

We quickly placed a net below her to support her weight while we snipped the line. No apparent injuries were seen – the line wrapped her left wing’s primary feathers, but no bones were broken, nor was any skin. She was exhausted and dehydrated. She was still willing to fight. We brought her back to our clinic.

After a complete exam – she was in relatively good shape, a healthy bird, living well – we gave her a mild pain medication and anti-inflammatory drug, warmed fluids, and a safe, quiet place to rest.

Kingfishers’ 3rd and 4th toes are united. We call this kind of foot syndactyl.

Two years ago, when we were building our waterfowl aviary, we included a perch high above the pool. No duck or goose would ever use it, but we know that occasionally a kingfisher will come into care. Kingfishers in their home plunge-dive, like a tern, an osprey, or a Brown pelican, for their fish. Small, powerful birds with an extreme amount of panache, in captivity they can be difficult to feed. This aviary was about to get its test.

The next day in care we gavage-fed a liquid protein diet to continue her re-hydration. She was alert and attempting to fly so we moved her to the waterfowl aviary with the kingfisher perch. Over the course of that day she improved rapidly – not well enough to be released yet, but highly encouraging.

Our waterfowl aviary does double duty as Kingfisher housing.

The next morning she was sitting in the early sun, on the high perch above the pool that we’d stocked with small “feeder” fish. At her morning check she flew in circles around the aviary. She was fully restored. Her flight was perfect. She was a lucky bird.

Her release evaluation was quickly completed and the kingfisher was driven back up to Blue Lake and the river above the hatchery.

Belted Kingfisher, on her perch in the morning sun – feeling much better!

Fishing line kills thousands of animals along our coast each year. Our annual clean-up days do a lot to raise awareness and improve the environment, but much more is needed. Every time we go into the woods, to the beach, down the river, to the grocery store, we need to see what stupid thing has been lost or littered and pick it up. What if this beautiful and fit kingfisher had gotten tangled 3 weeks from now, and she hadn’t been seen. It could easily have gone that way, and somewhere it will. She would have died and somewhere nearby, her babies would have cried for her return that would never come. Earth Day is a fine thing, but really, Mother Earth needs us every day. Just as we need her.

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Your support makes our rescue and rehabilitation efforts possible. Please donate what you can. Every contribution helps us provide skilled and equipped care for native wildlife. Thank YOU!

Scroll down for more pictures and video of release.

Capture for release evaluation – not as easy as it looks…

The long path home, into the wild!

Arriving at the river’s bank…

A rare moment…

Happy wildlife caregivers celebrate Earth day every day!

Photos of birds flying away are the best!

Belted Kingfisher’s plea, “Don’t leave your killing debris in our river!”

All photographs Laura Corsiglia/BAX.

What am I in for? Well, let me tell you….

Posted on March 20, 2014 by Monte Merrick

This Western Gull, entangled in fishing line and hooks at Trinidad Pier, was recently in our care (photos and story soon to come). You can help Bird Ally X/Humboldt Wildlife Care Center rescue and provide the necessary care for wild animals, like this gull, who encounter the modern world at its worst.

No one wants a fish hook for dinner.

Please contribute. Thank you for being a part of this life-saving work!

Gull Rescued Today in Trinidad

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Monte Merrick

15 minutes before closing on 18 March the phone rang at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center. A young gull with a fish hook through his beak was begging for food at the Lighthouse Grill in Trinidad, about 15 miles north of Arcata.

When we arrived on the scene, we found exactly what the caller had described. With a little bit of patience and a little bit of available bait (by the way, the french fries from the Lighthouse Grill looked very good – hopefully we’ll get back for more when on less pressing business!) and with the appreciated assistance of the folks who made the initial call, we were able to net the young Glaucous-winged gull. We returned to the clinic and removed the nasty hook. There is no more rewarding work than succussfully removing a hook from a wild animal. (update: local ornithologist Rob Fowler has observed (see comment below) that this bird is most likely a Glaucous-winged x Western hybrid, so here’s a link to Western gulls too!)

The gull is in care now, treated with pain medication and offered healthy hook-free fish! The bird has an excellent prognosis.

Thanks to Julie and friend who made the call and stayed to help, to the onlookers who watched from a safe distance, to the older gull whose competition for the french fries made our soon-to-be-patient less wary of our net, and to everyone who supports our work and makes it possible for us to go on these rescues and provide the necessary care!

To learn more about fishing line and how it effects local wildlife check out this story from a month ago. All pictures Laura Corsiglia/Bird Ally X

Derelict Fishing Gear Keeps on Killing

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Monte Merrick

Hooked by Unattended Line, Western Gull Heals and is Released

Posted on February 20, 2014 by Monte Merrick

At a quarter to five a couple of Sundays ago, just as we were completing the day’s tasks and getting ready to leave the clinic, the phone rang. An employee at Pacific Seafood, a fish processing facility on the Eureka waterfront, had spotted a gull nearby who was tied to some fishing line. We quickly fed the last couple of patients and headed out to take a look.

Fish hooks and fishing line cause numerous wildlife injuries. The toll fishing gear takes on marine birds, reptiles, and mammals (not to mention the targeted species!) numbers in the thousands along the California coast alone each year. (see study here) According to the Humane Society of the United States (link here) over a million marine animals are killed each year by “longline” fishing at sea.

(a collection of hooks and other items removed from patients at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center)

Hook and line injuries are commonplace for all wildlife rehabilitators, especially in locations where wildlife and people co-exist in large numbers – San Francisco, Monterey Bay, Los Angeles…

When we arrived on the scene, the fellow who called was standing a few yards from an adult Western Gull (link), who was trapped on the wharf, a hook in his (or her) neck attached to a line tied to the railing. Someone had been fishing and left his rig in the water. The gull had tried to eat the bait and gotten hooked.

We netted the gull and wrapped her (or him) in a towel. We made a quick examination to see if the hook could be immediately removed. Sometimes, with a quick snip of the barbed end, the hook comes out, and the small wound is fine to heal on its own – the bird can be released right away. In this case, however, the hook was small and difficult to see in the fading late afternoon light. For safety’s sake, we brought the gull back to our Bayside clinic.

Under the examination light, the small hook was easy to see. After removing it, we found a deep pocket of pus inside the gull’s mouth – an old infected injury. The bird’s feet also had early stage pressure sores caused by a life spent on concrete.

There is no getting around the fact that in a very short time modern industrial civilization has re-shaped the world that we share with other animals, other life. Derelict fishing gear, automobiles, ocean pollution, climate disruption, domestic animals, glass windows, resource extraction, – the list is long and each threat is new. All the marine birds we see today have existed as they are for at least 20 million years (Gaston 2004). Each of this gull’s injuries was the result of civilization’s altered environment.

The infection in our patient’s mouth required a course of antibiotics. We gave the first dose and set up safe housing for the night, fed some fish that had no sharp surprises, turned off the lights and headed home.

The next morning we moved the bird to our aviary built especially for gulls, pelicans, and cormorants – all marine birds who spend time in and out of water. With a large pool, an artificial rock wall, high perches and a substrate (all surfaces that the birds might perch on) intended to relieve the constant pressure on their delicate feet, this aviary is a key part of our rehabilitation program. When treating wild animals, patient housing plays a leading role in their recovery.

Over the course of the next ten days the gull’s condition swiftly improved. The deep wound inside his mouth healed, the punctures from the hook healed. Her (or his) feet had improved too.

Last Tuesday the gull was released at North Jetty. Once out of the box, the bird took time to preen – which is how birds maintain their feather condition. Besides allowing flight, the feathers of all birds protect them from the elements. For aquatic birds this is particularly necessary – as warm blooded animals who live in the cold North Pacific need an impeccable array of feathers simply to surivive. Once satisfied that all was well, s/he launched from the rocks out over the inlet to Humboldt Bay and was gone.

There are many things you can do to help prevent this kind of injury to wild animals:

Most importantly, if you fish, mind your gear. Try not to leave anything in the environment. Line, hooks, weights, all of these can produce fatal and torturous wounds.
If you find derelict gear in the environment, remove it! Every hook removed from the docks, beaches and river banks is a hook we won’t ever have to remove from a bird’s mouth.
Pass this information along!
Support wildlife rehabilitation. Our ability to do this work depends directly on community support. BAX/HWCC is not funded by the county, state or federal governments. Your contribution makes our work possible. Thank you!

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Release Photographs!

HWCC/BAX volunteers prepare to release the Western Gull
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Western Gull steps out to freedom
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