Badger Run

This last weekend Badger Run received a call from a good samaritan who witnessed a White Pelican literally drop from the sky after a juvenile injured it with a slingshot. Badger Run volunteers spent about 4 hours wading thru murky water filled with reeds & sinkholes to rescue this bird. The bird is in good health, but sustained a broken wing. The pellet the kid used to shoot the poor bird is lodged in the bone & cannot be removed, but provided the bird will eat in captivity, we’re hoping for a full recovery. Here are some pictures of our volunteers anesthetizing the bird, the X-ray, & applying the splint.

Parents, please educate your children in what NOT to do with slingshots, pellet guns, & firearms they may be given at a young age.  This young man & his family now face fines & even possible jail time.  Harming a migratory bird is a violation of the 1918 federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

UPDATE (4/14/2015) Our Bald Eagle patient is doing very well.  Just took some follow up X-rays the other day & it looks like a nice bone callus is forming at the site of the break. Jury is still out on if we’ll be able to release him back to the wild, but there’s still a good chance.

This is a juvenile Bald Eagle that came in last night. As the X-ray shows, he has a badly shattered ulna, yet the radius is intact.  This strongly suggests that he is victim of a gunshot wound, rather than being hit by a car.  We have reported the incident, but the likelihood of catching the perpetrator is pretty low.  If caught this person would face thousands of dollars in fines and jail time.  We will never understand the reasoning behind shooting at raptors.  It is purely just animal cruelty.

The well-meaning folks that found this Bald Eagle had him for a few days before they were able to find us. Unfortunately, they had been feeding him hamburger. In his severely emaciated state trying to digest any solid food, even hamburger, has weakened him even further. He is now on a tube-fed diet of Pedialyte and a small amount of A/D food to slowly “wake up” his digestive system and get it ready for solid food in a week or so. Please, if you find an injured animal, seek professional help immediately! You may mean well with attempts at supportive care, but without proper training, you may be doing more harm than good.   We’ll do our best, but please wish this “big guy” luck!

Our two most recent intakes, a diminutive Northern Saw-Whet Owl (left) & a Short-Eared Owl (right).  Both of these beauties have benefited from our new on-site digital X-ray capabilities.  The little Saw-Whet was determined to have a shattered shoulder (likely from an run-in with a car).  The Short-Eared was found hanging from a barbed wire fence by its neck by some kind folks who rescued it & X-rays amazingly show no broken bones.  The Saw-Whet’s injury may render him ultimately unable to fly, but he has a home for life with Badger Run if that ends up being the case (check our FaceBook page for updates).  The Short-Eared has some serious soft tissue damage making it hard for him to even hold his head up well right now, but we’re hoping with time & medical care he can make a full recovery & be released back to the wild.