Baby Season is Drawing to a Close
Admissions slowed this week. There were just 11, 6 raptors, 5 non-raptors, and one very tiny baby, a California Quail. Good grief, what are those mamma quail thinking!
Saturday: 3 Cooper’s Hawks and a Red-tailed Hawk
Saturday was kind of crazy. We had awesome help in the morning from volunteers Alyssa, Joshua, and Joshua’s visiting friend Dave. Mid-day, 3 family groups arrived for a tour, including volunteer Pam. In addition to visiting family, Pam brought one of the Cooper’s Hawks. Two more Cooper’s Hawks, and a Red-tailed Hawk were also admitted Saturday. Sadly, two of the Cooper’s Hawks were gunshot victims.
Cooper’s Hawk 19-451
This young hawk was found in a residential area in Irrigon, OR. He has three pellets in him. One pellet fractured his right ulna and then lodged in his chest. The right wing has been immobilized in hopes that the fracture will heal and the hawk will be releasable. If you look at the radiograph below, you will notice that the hawk is well muscled. He is a young bird who has successfully figured out how to catch his food.
Cooper’s Hawk 19-456
If you compare these two radiographs, you will notice 19-456 is a lot thinner than 19-451. There is much less muscle visible. He was likely going to be part of the 80% of young raptors who don’t survive the first year. Before that scenario could play out however, he was shot. Although there is no lead visible at the fracture site, the fracture and the entrance and exit wounds are consistent with a gunshot injury. The projectile was non-lead, copper or steel perhaps, which are much harder metals than lead, and do not fragment when they strike bone. The humerus fracture was not repairable and the hawk was euthanized.
“Baby” Releases
On her way home, Pam had help from her grand children in releasing two young robins, two young Mourning Doves and a Killdeer at McNary Wildlife Refuge in Burbank, WA.
