Fixin’ a Hole where the Skunk gets in, and stop Her from Going in to Den… (or a Raccoon)

Posted on February 9, 2018 by Monte Merrick

by Lucinda Adamson
Assistant Center Manager
la@birdallyx.net

Now is the time to inspect and maintain your home and yard to ensure that, come spring, you won’t have any unwanted wild animals raising their families in your space.

Every year Humboldt Wildlife Care Center raises orphaned skunks and raccoons, most of whom need not have been orphaned. Typically the mother was trapped and relocated when homeowners heard or saw activity in the spring, not realizing they were separating a young family and leaving 3-5 infants alone to die unless their screams for help are heard and they are rescued in time.

Wild mothers look for places that are warm, dark, quiet and protected to give birth and raise their babies. Once the babies are old enough (2-3months) they will follow their mothers out at night and the den will be abandoned until next spring. In urban environments, Raccoons may den under the house, often in the void around the bathtub, or in the attic where the entrance is hard to access and easy to defend from predators. Skunks often den under sheds or woodpiles

Walk around your property pay careful attention to these areas:

Foundation vents: make sure all vents are covered with metal screen. Gently push on all vents to ensure the screen is firmly attached. Any missing screens, broken screens, or rusty screens should be replaced.
Signs of digging: especially around foundation, sheds, and porches
Mobile home or porch skirting: Make sure there are no missing boards or openings that will allow access to animals. Even small holes should be patched.
Attic vents and roof overhangs: Make sure vents are screened and all openings are securely covered.
Chimney: Make sure the chimney cap didn’t blow off in the winter storms. Bats and swifts roost or nest in chimneys and other animals could fall in and become trapped.
Roof: Trim back any tree branches that may provide roof access to raccoons. Never trim branches during nesting season, though!

Securing these access points will prevent wild mothers from using your home as their nursery. Since these dens are only used to raise young, winter is the best time to make any necessary repairs because it is unlikely that any animals will be trapped inside. If you do suspect an animal is actively using an opening call us at HWCC (707) 822-8839, so we can help determine when it is safe to close the opening.

A little time spent maintaining your home now can help prevent a lot of suffering for your wild neighbors come spring.

An orphaned Raccoon is released after 4 months in care. It’s better for everyone if Mama raises her own babies.

If raccoons or skunks do end up denning under your home, take heart in knowing they won’t be there for long. If you are able to tolerate their presence for a few months they will be on their way before long.

If you are not able to tolerate their presence, do NOT set a trap and do NOT call a pest control company. It is possible to convince the mother to move her babies to another den away from your home and we can help humanely resolve the situation in a manner that satisfies you and the animals. Call us and we will be happy to walk you through the steps that will work best for your situation.

As always, thank you! Your support not only helps us provide excellent care for our wild neighbors in need, but also helps us prevent orphanings and injuries in the first place! Promoting co-existence with our wild neighbors is not only the right thing to do, it’s also the smart thing.

How can you mend a broken wing?

Posted on February 9, 2018February 9, 2018 by Monte Merrick

We strive to do the best work we can, for our patients, for our community, for our Mother Earth.

We strive to improve. We strive to better translate the needs, the injuries, the desired futures of our wild patients into something that our fellow citizens of this built world can hear. It’s hard work, but not too hard. We are all allies of the wild. The wild is the first ally of us all.

Over the next few months we’ll be asking for support as we prepare for our busy and financially stressful Spring and Summer months. We need your support now. We’ll need it then. Thank you for making a difference for our wild neighbors when they’re in a jam.

A New Loon’s Year

Posted on February 6, 2018February 6, 2018 by Monte Merrick

Our friends at Friends of the Dunes called one Monday morning in the middle of January to tell us that someone had stopped by their facility, the Humboldt Coastal Nature Center, to report a stranded Loon. We were well staffed that morning so we were able to send a couple people over to take a look. All Winter long we admit seabirds into care who are struggling, for one reason or another, and wind up on the beach in serious trouble.

Seabirds, including those like Loons, who raise their young on freshwater lakes and winter on salt water bays and near shore ocean, evolved millions of years ago to a life spent primarily on water. Dense pale feathers on their ventral surface, below the waterline, keep birds warm in the cold ocean and also provide cryptic coloring against predators from below, such as sharks, sea lions, and whales, who may have a harder time detecting the birds floating above them in the light. Another change the aquatic environment has driven in some species is the placement of the pelvis and legs far to the rear of their bodies. As foot-propelled pursuit divers, loons and grebes are dramatic examples of this adaptation. On land these kinds of birds appear very awkward, often unable to stand or walk. Relatively heavy birds, on land they can be literally stranded (stuck on a strand, i.e. beach) where they need a running start across open water to gain the speed necessary for lift. Because of this many people who find them on a beach might mistakenly think the bird is suffering a broken leg!

Typically, all of these adaptations add up to the fact that a seabird on the beach needs help. A terribly vulnerable location, only a bird with no other options would chose the beach over the water, where everything that supports life is found. Injuries, contaminants such as oils that interfere with the feathers’ waterproof insulation, and illness are common factors in stranded birds, but most often, the birds we admit from beaches are juveniles spending their first winter at sea.

Struggling to feed themselves, storms, heavy surf and the challenges of learning the ropes on the job all contribute to the failures of these birds, especially in our times, when ocean health is in a critical state. Over-fishing, agricultural waste run-off, plastic pollution, derelict fishing gear and the great onrushing disaster of climate chaos make the already challenging ocean into a rapidly unfolding disaster.

When our staff arrived at the beach in Manila, they quickly found the bird, a juvenile Pacific Loon (Gavia pacifica), high up the beach above the line of wrack that marked the highest tide. Quickly scooping him up, they brought the young bird back to Humboldt Wildlife Care Center.HWCC volunteer heads back up the dune with a young Pacific Loon safely in the box. (photo: Lucinda Adamson/BAX)

On the admission exam we found no real problems – just a young thin bird who’d missed to many meals. The loon was fortunate. Another day unseen and dehydration alone would have begun taking a terrible on his health. Instead, we were able to stabilize his condition and get him turned around. Within a day he was floating in one of our pools, rapidly recovering. In cases like this, fish is medicine.
Our pools are a critical part of our facility. Aquatic birds make up nearly half the patients that HWCC treats.

Typically, it takes about 3 weeks for a seabird to recover from emaciation. This bird however, was in somewhat better condition, and also individuals vary. Some just get down to the business of recovery faster, either due to relative health, certain capabilities, or any of the myriad other factors that we can sense or imagine, but may never know. In any case, after 11 days in care, this Loon was ready to go home. Besides the measurable parameters, such as body mass and red blood cell percentages that we use for all seabirds. Able to “dive like a banshee” (an in-joke here at the clinic – banshees scream; they don’t dive.), meaning when we tried to capture for an exam, he would slip beneath the water and swim laps around the pool, staying down for minutes at a time.
It’s a simple, inescapable fact that none of our procedures are done with the consent of our patient. This fact demands that we bring our A-game to all of our actions, but especially in our empathy for the indignities of our handling. Swift, gentle, decisive and accurate are the qualities we strive for in all our dealings. Acknowledging the stress and trauma of captivity that all of our patients endure so that we can mitigate their impact is an important ingredient in respecting them and providing the care they need.

So on a cool, cloudy morning we took the Loon down to the edge of Humboldt Bay for release. As soon as he hit the water, he dove, eager to rinse the stench of his caregivers from his beautiful and oceanic young feathers and get back to the business of his life, riding the wave of a second chance.

The last box this Loon will know – heading out for release.

At the release site, an HWCC volunteer lifts the Loon gently to place in the water.

And under he goes!

Back up!

And he begins to sail off, freedom and salt water and hopefully no walls confining him ever again.

Alone at last, our ex-patient starts hunting for his own fish.

So far this year we’ve already admitted over 60 of our wild neighbors, each of them desperate for care, a certain death the only other avenue. We’re committed to providing that care. We’ve built the pools; we’ve stocked the larder; we’ve trained the staff. None of these would’ve ben possible without your support. Thank you!

We’ve begun our fundraising to prepare for another busy year. We need to raise $25,000 by the end of April. This will get us through the first half of the Summer, and by then we’ll need to ask again. We hope you can help get us there! If you can, please donate today! Thank you!

photos: Laura Corsiglia/BAX except where noted

Western Pond Turtle Avoids Life in Captivity Thanks to Alert Craigslist Seller! (photos!!)

Posted on December 27, 2017 by Monte Merrick

Although nearly every patient who we admit at Humboldt Wildlife Care Center is a victim of industrial society, not all victims are injured. Recently we took a call from a man in Scotia, south of Humboldt Bay, telling us that while he’d had an aquarium listed on Craigslist someone had contacted him asking if it was suitable for a turtle. He’d asked what species and the person had told him he didn’t know but that he’d found the turtle in the Eel river.

The caller said that he’d convinced the man to surrender the turtle and that he would bring the kidnap victim to us the next day.

Among all wild species of vertebrates, reptiles and amphibians are some of the least protected by law. In California as long as you carry a sport-fishing license you may legally possess anywhere from one to an unlimited amount of turtles, frogs, salamanders, etc on any given day. Western Pond Turtles (Emys marmorata), however are listed in by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife as Species of Special Concern, due to their restricted range and relatively small population. (see more info about CDFW’s special species list here.)

True to his word, the caller came by the next day with a Western Pond Turtle. After an exam, we determined that the turtle was in good health with no injuries, so the next day we too him back to secluded spot along the Eel river near Scotia.

Our examination found no problems at all. A healthy male Western pond turtle!

We selected a release site along the Eel River near Scotia, where the turtle was first kidnapped.

And then he sunk from view back into the surrounding and surrounded Wild.

While laws might not protect reptiles and amphibians as much as we’d like, laws are not the only thing that keep us and those we cherish safe. Awareness, respect, common sense, and an imagination that allows us to see the central fact of any living being’s right to be, their right to co-exist with us without harassment and unharmed. This is a major part of our work. Your support allows us to do all that we can to promote co-existence with our wild neighbors, and to remind the adults of our society of the love for the Wild into which they were born and for whom they’d once had an affinity as natural as love for our mother.

Thank you for making sure we’re here, doors open, ready to provide whatever assistance is needed to our wild neighbors. If you’d like to support our work, please donate today!

all photos: Laura Corsiglia/BAX

What in the World is a Surf Scoter? (hint: not what. who.)

Posted on April 11, 2017April 12, 2017 by Monte Merrick

The telephone rings:

“Humboldt Wildlife Care …”

“Hi, I’m on Clam Beach and there’s a bird right here that can’t walk or fly. I’ve never seen a duck like this. It’s black and white and orange…”, says the caller.

“Sounds like a surf scoter -” and the caller interrupts to yell out to someone else, “He says it’s a surf scooter.” That’s what most people say when they first hear this duck’s name. The word scoter just doesn’t compute – must have been scooter. And actually, they’re right. Scoter, rhyming with motor, has the same etymology as scooter, meaning one who goes quickly – the motor scooter follows the duck, not the other way around.

Almost always, a Surf Scoter (Melanitta perspicillata) on the beach is a bird in trouble.

[If the caller can do so safely, we ask them to pick the bird up, wrap in a towel or jacket and bring them to our facility, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center. If for some reason they can’t, such as no towel, they have dogs with them, or they just don’t think they can do it, we ask for a precise location and organize volunteers to go out and try to capture the ailing bird. Given the size of our region, this is often impractical. By the time we organize a trip to Crescent City from Bayside the chance that bird is still there is slender. So it’s very helpful when a caller becomes a rescuer.]

Surf Scoters are fairly large sea ducks who spend their winters in coastal marine habitats, including the Redwood Coast, often visible just beyond the breaking waves in large groups, where they spend most of their time, except when searching for food in the surf, as their name suggests. Come Spring, the adults leave the coast for far Northern freshwater lakes in Alaska and Canada to raise the year’s young.

As wildlife rehabilitators, we never see Surf Scoter babies. They aren’t introduced to us until they have learned to fly. In the past Surf Scoters have arrived on the California coast from their breeding grounds in early fall. In ordinary times, we typically treat birds who are struggling with basic survival, often for reasons we might never learn. Weak, very thin, dehydrated – our most likely Scoter patient is found like this on area beaches.

The beach is a bad place for a Surf Scoter. A Scoter is shaped by the sea. After millions of years of living on water, sea birds who spend most of their time on water, have legs set far to the rear of their bodies and are very awkward on land. Also, unlike dabbling ducks, such as Mallards, sea birds, including Scoters, can’t simply fly from the land. They need a a running start to gain flight. Also, there is no food on the beach. Surf Scoters eat aquatic invertebrates, such as mollusks and crabs, found in near shore waters on the ocean floor, among sand or rocks. They dive up to 25 meters (approx 75 feet) deep, using both their wings and their feet to swim beneath the surface. It’s an environment that demands any of its inhabitants’ A game. But if you can’t make it there, coming to the beach is only a temporary solution. For a sea bird, the beach is the beginning of a rapid decline, with death the only outcome unless rescued.

Another serious threat to Surf Scoters is petroleum. Surf Scoters are rated in the second highest group on an index for vulnerability to oil spills.(1) West coast winter storms increase the risk oil spills. Surf Scoters are very common residents of the bays along the coasts, exactly where oil empire infrastructure is likely to be, and likely to malfunction. In 2007 when a container ship, the Cosco Busan, collided in dense fog with the bridge that connects Oakland and San Francisco, tens of thousands of gallons of the vessel’s fuel was spilled into San Francisco Bay. Thousand of birds were killed. Among the hardest hit were Surf Scoters. It is estimated that nearly 4 percent of the wintering population of these birds was killed by that spill.(2)

If all that isn’t bad enough, with a changing climate that is strongly affecting the circumpolar north already, and ocean conditions that have not been favoring the food chain, Surf Scoters, like all marine species, have an uncertain future.

Currently, we have two Surf Scoters in care. Each was found stranded. Neither suffered any injuries, but both were admitted very thin, with internal parasites, dehydrated and weak. Right now they’re prognosis is guarded, but we’re optimistic.

For the same reasons that the beach is a terrible place for a seabird, so do these specialized birds require a pool when in care. If we housed them in a “cage”, they would soon succumb to multiple kinds of secondary injuries that such housing would cause. Pressure sores would develop on every part that came in contact with the hard surfaces. Compared to water, even foam is a hard surface.

At our clinic we provide species-specific care, which means that we must have multiple kinds of housing available for the wide array of wild animals we rehabilitate. These two Scoters are housed in one of our seabird pools, where they can float comfortably in privacy, regain body mass, receive treatment for parasites and any other condition that they present, and recover.

Even though both birds are Surf Scoters they are still easy to tell apart. The bird on the right is an adult male and the bird on the left is an immature male, just beginning to molt into his adult feathers. If they were both mature males, we’d have to put on temporary leg bands in order to keep them straight.

Water is expensive! We recover and filter our water as much as we can.

All our patients need privacy. When recovering, stress is very contra-indicated! Elements are added to all patient housing that provides a place to hide when human caregivers are nearby, such as the hanging strips that these birds can swim behind.
Feeling safer behind the barrier, a stealthy photographer can observe these birds at rest and better assess their true condition. When a sick or injured wild animal is aware of our presence, they will often try to appear stronger than they really are, only letting their guard down when they feel alone.

In the best of times all are deserving of compassionate and skilled care. Wildlife rehabilitation would be an important project no matter how rosy an outlook we faced. In times as uncertain as ours, when our shared world is under a constant barrage of threats and all of us kindred live things are in peril, providing care for the innocent wild animals that are caught in this terrible net that Nature did not weave, our work is even more critical. Your support keeps us from stranding. Qith your support, we not only are able to provide individual care to a diverse array species, but we are also able to learn and teach how to give quality care on very few resources. In the coming decades, this will be increasingly necessary. And besides, good husbandry of resources is always a good idea.

You can help us meet the challenge of our busy Spring and Summer seasons. Your support keeps our freezers full of food, our pools full of water, our wires full of juice. Thank you!

all photos: Bird Ally X

(1) King, J. G. and G. A. Sanger. 1979. “Oil vulnerability index for marine oriented birds.” In Conservation of marine birds of northern North America., edited by J. C. Bartonek and D. N. Nettleship, 227-239. Wildl. Res. Rep. 11: U.S. Fish Wildl. Serv.

(2) Anderson, Eric M., Rian D. Dickson, Erika K. Lok, Eric C. Palm, Jean-Pierre L. Savard, Daniel Bordage and Austin Reed. (2015). Surf Scoter (Melanitta perspicillata), The Birds of North America (P. G. Rodewald, Ed.). Ithaca: Cornell Lab of Ornithology; Retrieved from the Birds of North America: https://birdsna.org/Species-Account/bna/species/sursco

CODE RED – We Need Your Support!

Posted on August 19, 2016August 19, 2016 by Monte Merrick

Dear Supporters of Bird Ally X and Humboldt Wildlife Care Center,

Because I write most of the material that BAX and HWCC publishes on our website, social media, and mailings, it’s likely that if you have responded to one of our appeals for support in the last five years, I wrote that appeal. However, it isn’t often that I write in first person singular. In a departure from the usual, I’d like to talk to you directly, as the person largely responsible for the day to day operation of HWCC and a co-founder of BAX. And what I want to talk to you about is money.

[URGENT APPEAL – OUR FUNDS ARE DWINDLING BUT OUR WORK IS NOT!]

Raising money isn’t my background. I am a wildlife rehabilitator and poet (don’t worry – none of this will be in rhymed couplets), not a salesperson, not a lobbyist, not a fundraiser. That however doesn’t absolve me from the responsibility to ensure that our clinic has the resources we need to meet our mission. I worked with the rest of BAX’s co-founders on our mission statement, and it’s a mission that we take very seriously:

Bird Ally X is a collective of wildlife care-providers committed to raising the standard of care available for sick or injured aquatic birds and all wildlife. Bird Ally X works to help wild birds and all wildlife in their efforts to survive the hazards of civilization through:

the direct action of caring for wild animals in distress

supporting other rehabilitation groups through workshops and consultation

generation and proliferation of educational and informational materials and literature, for our colleagues and our neighbors

Bird Ally X will build, strengthen and further develop the resources available to ensure that excellent care is provided by working with colleagues in wildlife rehabilitation to maintain an environment of mutual aid and benefit.

In all efforts, Bird Ally X is committed to continually elevating the quality of available care, and providing uncompromising advocacy on behalf of wild birds and all wildlife.

Promoting co-existence with our wild neighbors, which means preventing conflicts, senseless deaths and injuries, and keeping wild families together, is integral to our work. It’s when we ask for support that we have our clearest opportunity to accomplish this aspect of our mission. This blog, our mailing list and our social media outlets, as well as our wild ambassador program are the everyday methods we have to accomplish this task. To persuade you that your money is contributed to something worthwhile, we have to describe our work. In order to describe our work, we must describe how our patients become jeopardized, what threats and challenges our society places in the free and wild lives of our wild neighbors as well as how these threats can be eliminated or at least minimized.

Awareness is raised. And hopefully your support is won. And BAX/HWCC can continue our work.

So I struggle with the task of constantly pleading for money, striving to ensure that our fundraising efforts also be educational and mission-oriented.

As a supporter of other non-profits, as a citizen, I have always preferred to support those organizations whose work and fundraising were linked. Working on a fundraising campaign that does not include an educational message seems to me a waste of time and materials, a waste of your consideration. So we are scrupulous that our appeals to our community for support also carry practical messages regarding co-existence, regarding information on injured wildlife, and regarding the ways that we can make our collective voices heard to impact policy or procedure (or the status quo) when these things are killing wild neighbors or causing any to suffer.

In strictly practical terms, our clinic staff is very occupied with our clinic work – we can’t work on unrelated tasks – car washes, yard sales, booze cruises, it doesn’t matter – any of these fine things are fine, but they aren’t mission-oriented. We are a very small organization with an enormous challenge – our focus needs to be on our work and not our fancy ball!

Money is such a difficult subject. We all exist in a world that values currency over nature; – absurd to pretend otherwise. If it weren’t the case, the forests of the world would still be intact. Yet, currency provides the fish our patients eat. Currency provides the water our facility needs to provide pools for waterbirds. Currency keeps our lights on and our pumps running.

Of course, the primary reason we never stop asking for money is obvious. Patients never stop coming through our door. Today is Friday. Since Monday we have admitted over 20 patients. From a nest of Barn swallows to a Long-tailed Weasel. Each in need. Each the result of some conflict with our society – hit by cars, caught by pets, nest illegally destroyed – and more.

Each day we open our doors to receive the injured wild animals our human neighbors find by the side of our metaphorical and actual highways. Not the roadkill, just the road-maimed who would have suffered and died a cruel and senseless death. Even though we have outreach efforts into every corner of our community, still each day we are told “I didn’t know you existed! I’m so glad you are here!”

We are here. We are here because of your support. Right now we are in dire need. This year is on track to be our busiest in the history of HWCC. Yet we are not in the midst of some emergency, as has happened in past years, during which we send out a special appeal, and take extraordinary measures. We are just struggling along… with this Red-shouldered Hawk, this Cedar Waxwing, this Gray Fox.

So far in 2016 we have provided direct care for 800 wild animals. We’ve handled thousands of phone calls that often result in an injury prevented, or a wild family kept intact. We’ve admitted patients from as far away as Mount Lassen and Sacramento. We’ll likely admit 500 more patients before the year ends.

So we’re in jeopardy ourselves. Without your support, we won’t be able to meet this intense challenge. We won’t be able to keep our doors open. We won’t be able to pay for the water, the food, the medicine, the gas, the electric, the trash pickup, the propane, the rent, the salaries of our two paid staff members who are critical to ensuring quality of the care we provide.

I’m pleading with you to help us with any amount you can… if half the population of our local community each gave us one dollar, our expenses would be paid through the end of the year! Imagine if only 1% signed up to be a sustaining member at $10 per month! In any case, your support goes directly to our work helping the injured and orphaned wildlife of our region. We need $7000 by the end of August. We’re on our way but still far from that goal. Please, every little bit helps…

Thank you for your consideration, your support, and, mostly, thank you for your love for our wild neighbors.

Take care,
Monte Merrick
co-director/co-founder Bird Ally X

A Hawk Discovers You Can Go Home Again

Posted on July 31, 2016August 1, 2016 by Monte Merrick

In mid-June, a very ordinary thing happened. Someone called our clinic to ask for help with a bird who’d fallen from a high nest. Typically, we’d like to get birds who fall from their nest back to their families right away. But this case had some complications. First, the bird was in Petrolia, which is part of the area we serve, but is a couple of hours away and second, the nest location wasn’t known.

[Thank YOU!! – We made it to $5000 by the end of July! And a few hundred dollars more!! your support makes our work possible! Our August goal of $7000 will allow us to buy fish to feed our growing seabird caseload, as well as continue providing care for all of this season’s orphaned wild babies – raccoons! swallows! hawks! jays! and more! Please contribute what you can! Every donation helps! Click here to donate now!]

The bird happened to be a Red-shouldered Hawk (Buteo lineatus), an easily recognized member of our community. These magnificent small hawks can be seen along almost any rural road, working over almost any open field, perched in nearby trees, hunting for primarily rodents along the edges of almost everything. Each year we typically raise at least one of these hawks, and sometimes more. This hawk was on the larger side so we imagined that she was female.

Without knowing the location of the nest, there was little chance for us to return this wayward nestling to her family. Even raising her until fledging wasn’t going to be enough, because these birds depend on their parents after they’ve left the nest for food until they are able to hunt. So we’d have to keep this bird in care until she was able to recognize and eat real prey. Fortunately, our patient was an older nestling, close to being ready for flight.

Immediately, the hawklet began to devour all the food we offered, thawed mice, thawed rats, basically any small animal we fed. And we watched as real world feathers grew in and the bird changed into a sleek, beautiful juvenile.

In the aviary with another young raptor, the Red-shouldered hawk (on the left) is alert and wary.

After 6 weeks, and after she demonstrated her ability to hunt, we returned the hawk to Petrolia and released her. Of course we hoped that she would find family members and remember enough of the area that she’d learned from the view from the nest, but in any case we were confident that this young raptor would be able to fend for herself.
Capturing the hawk from the aviary for her release exam. Every examination puts a great deal of stress on a patient. We reduce this handling as much as possible.
Keeping raptor feet healthy in an environment where they spend more than an ordinary amount of time perched in one location is important. After 6 weeks in captivity this hawk’s feet are in perfect condition.

Her eyes, mouth, hearing – every aspect of this hawk screamed “Release me!” So we did.

It’s a long and stunningly beautiful drive to Petrolia, the human capital of the Lost Coast.

Without knowledge of the nest location, a release site was chosen based on proximity to Petrolia and suitability of habitat – the presence of trees, open land, and the Mattole River made this a good site.

Release!

Our patient in flight, over the home she was meant to have.

Here is a very short video that really shows the explosive speed of this young hawk…

The story doesn’t stop here. Within a few minutes from release, the young former patient postioned herself on the highest tree in the area and began calling. Within a few more minutes, an adult Red-shouldered Hawk arrived on the scene.
Perched and calling, soon two other Red-shouldered Hawks, at least one of them an adult, arrived. Was the adult a parent to this youngster? Well, we can’t say for sure. We believe so. One thing we know with certainty: they left the area together. A re-united family is the likely explanation.

The last shot gotten as the young bird followed the adults into the trees beyond view.

This hawk’s return to freedom is one of the important outcomes of your support for our work. More than rehabilitation is needed, of course. These hawks still must live in a world where casual violence, habitat destruction, rodenticides, lead and myriad other non-natural challenges make life in the wild more precarious than it should be. Your love for the wild and respect for Mother Earth also goes a long way toward preserving the world and celebrating life.

Want to be part of our life-saving work? Please donate today. Your contribution goes directly to the care of injured and orphaned wild animals on the North Coast and beyond. Thank you!!!

all photos: Laura Corsiglia/ Bird Ally X

Feathers Badly Singed in Fire, Osprey Fitted For Second Chance.

Posted on July 28, 2016July 28, 2016 by Monte Merrick

Earlier this summer, we admitted a weakened and burned Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) who’d been the victim of a nest fire northeast of Weaverville, well over 100 miles away from our clinic.

[July is nearly over and we still need your help reaching our goal of $5000 raised by the end of the month! Please donate! And thank you to everyone who has already! ]

The burns that the bird suffered had a good prognosis, and generally speaking, the “fish hawk” was in good shape, except for one critical component: all of the Osprey’s primaries, or flight feathers, were singed beyond usefulness, as were all of his tail feathers.

Without these feathers, our patient couldn’t fly, let alone plunge feet first from the sky into Trinity Lake, and then muscle his way back from the water into the air, carrying off a large fish for a meal for himself or his young.

In this condition, the Osprey was far from releasable. We gave him a safe aviary and plenty of fish and looked for signs that he was entering his molt cycle, the time of year when birds renew their feathers… Osprey do replace them at this time of year, so we hoped for a natural cure.

After a few weeks though it became clear that waiting for a molt was going to take too long for this bird. So we turned to another option.

Imping is a process by which old feathers can can be replaced. Of course, donor feathers of the same species are required. In February 2012 we’d released a Thayer’s gull whose primary feathers on one wing had been crushed. Using similar gull flight feathers we successfully imped them to the cut shaft of the damaged feathers. This isn’t surgery. This is more like furniture repair, or life-saving hair extensions.

The success of that patient’s treatment led us to start a feather bank, just as there are blood banks and organ donors. Back in April of 2014, we’d admitted an Osprey for care who’d suffered a severe humerus fracture. Humane euthanasia was the only appropriate treatment. Once the bird’s suffering was over, we removed a complete set of primary feathers and tail feathers. Stored against damage from elements or insects, these feathers were in the same condition, over two years later, as when we’d first collected them.

Now this Osprey of 2016 will get a second chance.

Complete set of the primary flight feathers for the right wing of an adult Osprey. Flight feathers are called remiges, a latin word combining the word for oar and the verb to drive – it is accurate to think of these feathers as the oars birds use to paddle through the air.

First new flight feather, alongside the damaged one.

A heated scalpel blade easily slices through the keratin shaft of the feather.

A small dowel is glued into the hollow shaft.

The same is repeated on the other side.

We stopped after replacing five feathers on the right side. Being handled for any length of time is very stressful for wild animals. We gave the Osprey a 20 minute break. Also it was time for our baby opossums to be fed and we needed the room!

We came back and repeated the process, but on the left side.

After finishing the five feathers on the left, the Osprey got another break. Each wing had taken approximately 30 minutes. The feather imping team could use the break too. The task isn’t technically difficult, but the stress level is high for everyone. After the break, that sad tail gets attention.

Because one of the Osprey’s center tail feathers has grown in, we decided to replace only the outside four on each side.

As the primary flight feathers are known scientifically as remiges, the tail feathers are known as rectrices. Rectrice, from the Latin, rector, or helmsman, rudder. So the flight feathers are the oars and the tail feathers are the rudder. And the bird who uses them is a sky kayaker.

After some time, we’ll evaluate for replacing the center damaged feathers as well. If we don’t need to, that would be terrific. Reducing the stress of our patients is a critical component of our care and we strive for the least invasive treatment possible.

This bird’s care isn’t over. He’s not even out of the woods. To be released we need to be confident that this bird will be able to survive on his own. After the full set of feathers has been imped, the strength and durability of the glue bond will be tested in our aviary. Once reasonably assured that the bond will hold the rigors of freedom, it won’t be long before this Osprey is growing in his own replacement feathers on his own time, in his own home – the wild.

Feathers are worth an entire life of study! An amazing evolutionary development that not only allows flight, but also allows a life at sea, a life in the arctic, a life in equatorial regions… closely related to hair, nails, claws and scales, feathers are a natural wonder the importance of which can’t be overstated. Want to learn more about feathers – start here.

Your support makes our work possible. Without you, this Osprey, as well as the baby Opossums who were in this room in an incubator just a few feet away during the entire procedure, would have no hope, no second chance. Want to help keep our work going? You can donate here.

All photos: Laura Corsiglia/Bird Ally X.

Great Egret Back in the Game!

Posted on July 19, 2016July 20, 2016 by Monte Merrick

Last Saturday at the end of the work day, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center’s staff wildlife rehabilitator, Lucinda Adamson, took a call. An Egret was struggling in the water at the Eureka Marina. The caller told Lucinda that he had already pulled the struggling bird, who he’d thought was tangled in fishing line from the water once, but that the bird had fallen back in…

When Lucinda arrived on the scene she found a water-logged and apparently dead Great Egret (Ardea alba) floating next to the dock. But as she bent to lift the spent body from the water, she noticed a soft and shallow breath.

Unresponsive, soaking and dangerously cold, the bird needed immediate help. Lucinda brought the brought the barely conscious Egret back to our clinic in Bayside. With a body temperature of 95˚F, there was little else to be done but provide warmth and warmed fluids.

Within a few hours, the Egret was again aware and alert, with a normal body temperature, dry and able to stand. Lucinda offered a handful of fish and privacy for the rest of the night. Come morning, the Egret was alert, standing, distressed by captivity and full of fish. All of the night’s dinner had been eaten.

Now stable, we performed a full examination. The Egret was in good shape. Well muscled, hydrated, – even the bird’s blood was well within healthy parameters. The only thing amiss was that her (or his) feathers were very disheveled. We placed her back into our large bird recovery housing and misted with fresh water all of her impressive white plumage, to encourage our lucky patient to put things back in order. The regular work that birds put in to feather care, preening, we call it, is a time-consuming and a very necessary part of the beauty of feathered flight.

Humboldt Bay is home to a large population of Egrets and Herons. We see them everywhere – hunting for rodents in farmland, fishing in marshes, moving softly on broad wings across the sky. On an island between the Samoa peninsula and the city of Eureka is a “rookery” where hundreds of Snowy Egrets and Great Egrets raise their young each year, May through August, looking like white blossoms on the stand of non-native Monterey Cypress (Cupressus macrocarpa) that these quintessential marshland birds have (de)colonized and redeemed.

By the end of this Egret’s first 24 hours in care, frustration with captivity had become his or her biggest problem. It began to seem likely that this adult had a family that needed attention. At the end of the second day, now certain that all of our patient’s feathers were restored, we released the Egret in view of the island of Egrets.

Help us reach our July goal of $5000 raised for our many wild patients this summer! Click here to contribute!

After leaping into flight and freedom out of our carrier, the Egret landed in an adjacent cove and took stock of the new situation. Soon the bird put some greater distance between us, flying to an exposed part of the mud flats farther into the bay.

And after a brief stay, the Egret lifted into flight again, this time flying high and directly toward the ‘rookery’ on the island of Egrets, toward what we hope is a happy reunion.

Our patient no more, simply another incredible Great Egret, alive and returning to his or her partner and young after a brush with death and a mysterious encounter – living into a second chance.

A happy rehabilitator! Lucinda Adamson after the bird has flown…

What saved this bird’s life? Your support. Your support makes it possible for us to have dedicated staff members, like Lucinda Adamson, who is the first full-time staff person HWCC has ever hired. Our growth in the community has meant an ever increasing caseload, and as our capacity increases with your support, so does the community that relies on us. Your support makes this all possible. Without your support there would be no wind beneath this Egret’s wings. Thank you for helping us help our wild neighbors.

All photos: Laura Coriglia/BAX

Wild at Heart

Posted on July 9, 2016July 9, 2016 by Monte Merrick

A volunteer feeds young Cliff Swallows (Petrochelidon pyrrhonota) on the verge of taking their first flight from our fledging box into the bright songbird aviary just beyond the screen. (photo: Laura Corsiglia /BAX)

Right now, our wildlife clinic, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, has nearly 100 patients in care. Ranging from a dozen Cliff Swallows, each from a nest somehow destroyed, to an Osprey whose feathers were badly singed by a nest fire near Weaverville; – from 23 orphaned young Raccoons to the 3 chipmunks found in a garage after their mother was killed by a trap.

We need your help! Want to help buy the formula, the fish, the supplies, the water, the electricity and more that we need? Click here to make a contribution through paypal, or send a check! Thank you!!!

Every day our phone rings dozens of times with calls from our neighbors near and far who’ve had an encounter, a conflict, or a question about a wild animal they just saw. Most people who call want to find help for an animal in need. Not every one who calls is a friend of the wild.

We give each caller the best we have, to advocate for the wild. The situation could be anything. It may be an animal in a trap, desperate for release and it is our task to make sure this is done, or it may be that there’s a nest with just hatched babies that someone wants to remove, or someone 80 miles away may have found an orphan who needs stabilizing care as soon as possible, and we are the closest facility.

Each call is that animal’s last shot at another chance. And sometimes we fail.

Sometimes the person calling doesn’t want to let the opossum out of the trap and the line goes dead. We call back and there is no answer. And we have nearly one hundred patients in care. Maybe we can’t save this opossum, but we do have other mouths to feed. So we move forward, carrying the phone in our pocket.

Summer is a remarkable season for a wildlife rehabilitation clinic. For many others, it’s a time of relaxation and outdoor enjoyment. For us, our hours are long; the tasks are hard. Still, the joys of seeing our patients mature into capable juveniles and adults are immeasurable. And the slow, silent changes the work makes in us – day in, day out – minute by minute – year by year – are endlessly surprising. We might expect to rise in the morning and find leaves growing from our hair, or certain desires to back into our musky dens and rest our chins on our forepaws through the night.

We do a pretty good job raising fierce little wild raccoons who we are certain are ready to be free in the wild universe at their release. We have good raccoon feeding protocols, and we watch them closely for success. We keep the intelligent and inqusitive young explorers as apart from us as we can, so that they might always prefer a field we don’t dominate. We give them the best schooling we can on where the food is, and why climbing is important. We keep them safe until keeping them causes them harm. It takes about 4 months, usually. Over 80% of the orphaned raccoon we treat make it. When they don’t survive, they are usually very young.

Last week, we lost a little guy, a male raccoon, small enough to hold in your hand. He went suddenly. In the course of a few hours on a weekend afternoon, he went from seemingly healthy to dead. His eyes had been open about ten days. Once his death was confirmed, we opened him to learn why. There were no clues. Just small raccoon ribs making a beautiful tiny cavern for his pink lungs and there, right against his spine, his wee raccoon heart. From his ancestral past to his guard hairs and whiskers to his utter core he was a beautiful raccoon, all wild, all fierce…

Our clinic is a small one. There are bigger facilities in other parts of the state, all over the world. We treat about 1200 patients each year and we help resolve the conflicts that may be saving a few thousand more from becoming injured that time, that day.

We operate on a quarter-acre of land alongside Jacoby Creek on the edge of Humboldt Bay. Our ‘campus’ consists of a double-wide mobile unit with thoughtful and frugal recovery enclosures for a variety of species, built in manner of homestead outbuildings on our very meager budget. Yet we are one of the points of congress between the built world and the wild.

Our clinic is a portal between the human and the wild that operates every day of the year. Our daily proximity to the wild, in the form of her orphaned and injured children, exposes caregivers, makes us more wild. Here at the center of the Redwood Coast, on the edge of our great Western Sea, under the sky and standing on ground that has seen thousands of years joy and sorrow, beauty and tragedy – suffered the losses of forests, of people, of species, of stability, here we are, now, alive, breathing, dreaming, and striving to help those for whom there would be nothing if we weren’t here.

We are one of the small hearts you’ll find at the center of everything.

PLEASE HELP. Your contribution goes directly toward our mission.

by Lucinda Adamson Assistant Center Manager la@birdallyx.net

by Lucinda Adamson
Assistant Center Manager
la@birdallyx.net