June 20, 2011

At the very end of May, the peregrine was moved back into a smaller outdoor enclosure — the bird just wasn’t making it up to the perches in the flight pen and wasn’t utilizing all of the space around her.  With the many other raptor patients that could use the flight pen space, she was moved to a smaller enclosure for the time being.

The falcon has been eating well over the past few weeks and has even put on more weight.  Her blood work continues to to be “within normal limits.”  Once a large enclosure opens up again, she will be moved into a larger area and monitored.

May 27, 2011

The peregrine has continued to do well outside — gradually standing more and more each day.  The veterinary team has continued to check her blood work weekly, since the bird has been battling some infection since being rescued and returning to Virginia in April.  While there was another spike in white blood cell counts earlier in the month, the most recent blood work performed on  May 24 showed great improvement. 

Since her feet are healthy, blood work is good, and she’s generally bright and alert and standing, the falcon was moved into a larger outdoor enclosure on May 24.   The staff will continue monitoring the bird closely and hope to see her making short flights around the enclosure soon.

May 5, 2011

The Peregrine Falcon has continued to intermittently stand up and lay down over the past couple of weeks — with most of her time laying down.  Her feet have continued to heal and no scabs remain — just nice, healthy pink tissue. 

On April 23, the veterinary team decided to put the falcon in an outdoor enclosure during the day, hoping that some additional visual stimulation would encourage her to stand.  Instead, the peregrine continued laying down, so she was once again brought into the hospital.

On April 26, additional blood work was performed.  This time, there were signs of improvement — the falcon’s red blood cells had increased and her white blood cell count decreased – which means her infection is resolving.  An additional complete blood count on May 3 showed even greater improvement.

Drs. Dave, Miranda, and Kelly discussed the immediate plan for the peregrine and decided to test her again in an outside enclosure — this time, in one that is smaller.  One thought is that the falcon’s feet may still be painful due to the fresh, delicate tissue present after her injury. 

On May 3, the Peregrine Falcon was moved outside.  On May 4 and May 5, she was standing more often.

April 15, 2011

The Peregrine Falcon continues to eat with gusto, and it shows – her weight is up to 865 grams.  For the past week, the falcon has still been laying down most of the time, though stands up each time she’s caught for daily treatments.  Her toes are healing and many scabs have fallen off, revealing a healthy pink tissue underneath.  This morning, Dr. Miranda trimmed a few scabs – the part that was not attached to the bird’s feet – in hopes of making the peregrine more comfortable.  The falcon stood up when she was placed back in her crate.

The most concerning news at this point is that the bird’s white blood cell count has continued to increase.  Without knowing the exact cause of this infection, the veterinary team has changed the course of antibiotics and has also started the peregrine on anti-fungals.   

April 8, 2011

The Peregrine Falcon’s status has not changed much since Monday; unfortunately, the bird continues to lie down in her crate most of the time.  Blood work revealed even greater improvements on protein levels, though she also has an increased white blood cell count, meaning there is an infection in the bird’s system.  Additional antibiotics have been started.

The peregrine continues to eat well, and at the very least, the veterinary staff are encouraged to see her stand up on her own before she’s caught for daily treatments.

Dr. Dave McRuer states, “At this point I’d say the bird has a guarded to good prognosis. That said, the bird seems to have survived everything from a  fractured shoulder, detached retina, 10 days in the wild with its feet tied together and no food, starvation, and a medical condition known as re-feeding syndrome that occurs when a starving patient is introduced back to nutrients.  In other words … the bird is a fighter.”

April 4, 2011

The Peregrine Falcon is back in Virginia! 

With Nature’s Nursery reporting improved blood work for the falcon last week, Wildlife Center staff felt that the peregrine would be able to travel and began looking for transport to get the bird back to Virginia.  Within four hours of putting out the request through the Norfolk Botanical Garden eagle-cam network, an incredibly generous Wildlife Center supporter in Columbus, Ohio stepped forward and agreed to deliver the bird to Waynesboro on Sunday, April 3.

After a long day on the road – a trip of some 530 miles – the Peregrine Falcon arrived at the Wildlife Center on Sunday evening.  Dr. Miranda Sadar was there to greet the bird and gave her a physical exam.  Not unexpectedly, the falcon is still thin, though she weighed in at 800 grams – a marked improvement.  Blood-protein levels were also greatly improved.  The falcon was dehydrated after her long day, and received fluids. 

The greatest concerns at the moment are the bird’s feet and her energy level.  There are scabs on many of the bird’s toes; in some cases, the skin on the toes is sloughing off.  When the bird was originally rescued in Paulding County, Ohio, its feet were caked in cement residue.  While this was quickly removed by the staff at Nature’s Nursery, it’s likely that the exposure to cement has caused the foot issues.  The peregrine has spent much of the day laying down in her crate. 

March 31 update

The Peregrine’s Falcon weight is up to 760 grams as of this morning — a good increase since her admission date to Nature’s Nursery two weeks ago.  Additional blood work was also taken this morning; results should be available tomorrow.  The Wildlife Center hopes that with good results on the blood work, arrangements can be made to bring the bird back to Virginia soon.

March 24 update

The Peregrine Falcon’s weight is slowly increasing and she continues to be alert and responsive.   The falcon is continuing to eat well for the Nature’s Nursery staff, though a little bit more slowly – the bird may be starting to get full since the size of her meals have increased.  She’s still receiving de-feathered pieces of quail. 

Additional blood work will be performed within the next few days. 

March 21 update

The condition of the Peregrine Falcon continues to be worrisome.  On March 19, Nature’s Nursery staff started offering the Peregrine Falcon chopped quail.  Several small meals were offered over the course of the day; the falcon readily ate the food.  

Unfortunately, the falcon lost weight after this change in diet.  The amount offered at each feeding will be increased over the next few days.  We are hopeful that with this additional boost in food, we will start to see the falcon put on weight.  Additional blood work will likely be performed later in the week. 

We are most grateful for the special care being provided to this bird by Nature’s Nursery.  With them, we will continue to monitor this case closely.

March 18 update

RESCUE!  On Wednesday March 16, a quarry coordinator at a cement plant in Paulding, Ohio, spotted the Peregrine Falcon that had escaped on March 9 in Ft. Wayne and was able to capture the bird.  The plant is about 35 miles from where the falcon originally escaped.  A local wildlife officer picked up the bird and transported it to Nature’s Nursery for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation Education, a wildlife center near Toledo, Ohio.

After a few phone calls between Nature’s Nursery and state wildlife officials, VA falconers Eva and Andrew were alerted and they confirmed that the falcon was indeed escaped Peregrine Falcon #10-2118.   The falcon was very thin and was still wearing all of her equipment. 

The emaciated condition of the falcon is cause for concern; she lost 260 grams in the week that she was missing.  On March 17, the Peregrine Falcon was examined by a vet and a small amount of blood was taken for analysis.   In addition to the emaciated body condition, the bird was anemic and had used up most of its fat and protein reserves.  Additional blood was sent away for further testing.  

Despite the blood work, the falcon is standing and overall seems bright, alert, and responsive.  The first six days of treatment for an emaciated raptor are the most critical.  In consultation with Wildlife Center veterinarians and their own vet, Nature’s Nursery staff are tube-feeding the falcon small quantities — spread out over four feedings a day.  The bird will also receive an iron injection.

If all goes well and the falcon’s condition improves, the Wildlife Center will make arrangements to transport the bird back to Virginia in the next two weeks. 

March 9 update

An unfortunate update on the Peregrine Falcon:   the bird escaped this morning in Fort Wayne, IN.  Last week, the peregrine traveled to the National Eagle Center in Minnesota with Eva and Andrew for the “Taste of Wabasha” festival.  On their way back home this week, they stopped in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  During the night, someone broke into the falconers’ car, stole a number of personal items, and tampered with the bird’s crate.  The bird’s leash was tied in a knot on the outside of the crate, but when the thief opened the box, the Peregrine Falcon dragged in the knot and unhooked it.

When Eva went back to the car this morning,  she opened the crate to check on the bird (unaware at that point that the car had been broken into), and the bird flew past her, out of the car and out of sight.  The bird had all its equipment on including anklets, jesses, and a swivel attaching the jesses.

Eva and Andrew have alerted falconers in Indiana to be on the look-out for this bird.  A raptor center in Fort Wayne has also been contacted; they will be alerting all the rehab centers in the area, the state rehabilitation association, animal control, and several birding groups. 

February 14 update

Peregrine Falcon #10-2118 is doing great! She now spends almost all of of her time on the flight line in the outdoor mews. She is not at all keen on very cold weather and would rather be somewhere nice and warm right now, so we take her inside on particularly cold nights. The days of worry about her weight and metabolism almost seem like ancient history now. We have managed to raise and maintain her weight at a much higher level, and she is now stable and happy at 930 grams (33 oz). The added bodyweight plus continued exercise she is getting on the diagonal flight line outside have made her chest much broader and more muscular, which is exactly what we wanted to happen.

We also feel that the range of motion of her wing on the previously fractured side has improved. Earlier, it was very clear that the two wings moved unevenly, but that is becoming less obvious now. She still holds that wing a bit differently when sitting still, but the difference now looks less pronounced when she’s flapping, which is very encouraging.

When we received “2118″ in December, she had a couple of scabs and spots under her feet as well as on her keel (breastbone) and cere (the waxy yellow skin above the upper beak). We’ve kept a close eye on all these spots ever since she’s been with us and have continued treating everything that needed a bit of extra TLC. Birds, particularly when they are sick and therefore not moving around a lot, have a tendency to develop inflammations on their feet, called bumblefoot, and they are painful and hard to treat. That’s why falconers usually pay a lot of attention to the materials the raptors perch on and check the feet regularly, because prevention and early detection of foot-issues are important. Fortunately, all the scabs and spots on the peregrine’s feet, keel, and cere have healed well and most of them are gone altogether.
 
There have been nice developments on the training front as well.  Over the past few weeks, we have been working with her mainly in the evenings after we get home from work. During these evening sessions, she works for her daily meal by repeatedly flying to our fist or the lure on the ground while being tied to a safety line (creance). As it is already dark at that time, we have to do that inside. She knows that routine well now.

On the weekends, however, we have the chance work with her during daylight hours and have recently introduced her to a slightly different training regimen:  we take her out to a large open field in our neighborhood and tie her jesses (that’s the strips of leather attached to her legs) to a very long kite-line for safety. The other end of the line is controlled by one of us. Then we give her the opportunity to fly off the fist. So far she has been hesitant about leaving the fist unless she is encouraged to do so.

Now, let’s remind ourselves why we are doing all this: we need to make sure that she is able to fly properly and to strike and kill game. If she cannot kill game, she will not be able to look after herself back in the wild. For this purpose, we purchased flight-conditioned bobwhite quail from a game bird breeder. These quail are going to be her “test subjects” during this phase of the training. 

During her first such outing, one of us had the falcon on the fist in the big field while the other one stood a little ways off and had the quail ready to be released in the falcon’s path. On this first try, we made sure that she didn’t have to work hard to get the quail in order to give her a good experience to start on. And she did great! It took her a few minutes to figure out what we wanted her to do, but once she saw the quail, she launched herself off the fist and went for it, grabbed and killed it quickly with a bite to the neck. Picture-perfect dispatching technique on her part! It shows that she knows exactly what to do with prey (not too surprising), but it also indicates that her vision is good enough to spot game. From now on, we will make it harder and harder for her to get game and push her limits further, bit by bit.
 
A few odds and ends:

- It has become very clear that ”2118″ is a seriously picky eater. She reacts very differently in her training flights, depending on which type of food she is being offered! Madam wants quail meat, and that’s it! The usual “staple” of day-old chicks? No, sir, absolutely not!

- She has made a clear choice as to who she wants to work with! She definitely prefers to work with Andrew! In my humble opinion, that just demonstrates that she (just like me) has exceptionally good taste! But seriously: It has been a common theme over the past 11 years that Andrew and I have been working with raptors. All the falcons we have ever worked with eventually got more attached to Andrew than to me, whereas all the eagles and hawks seemed to prefer me. Fortunately in our case, we have the benefit of working with all our birds as a team, so the raptors actually get a chance to choose.

- Peregrine 2118 had her grand appearance in front of the Virginia Senate on Thursday (Feb 10)! Andrew and I plus one other Virginia falconer testified in front of the Senate Courts of Justice Committee in favor of a bill to amend falconry laws in Virginia. We took our male Gyr/Saker hybrid falcon “Arc”, as well as “Peregrine 2118″ and had them on the fist while talking at the podium. The two falcons created a lot of positive buzz before and during the committee meeting and were wonderful ambassadors for raptor conservation, WCV, and falconry! The bill received unanimous consent and passed without a single “No” vote!

I’m looking forward to giving you our next update soon!

January 19 update

On Friday, January 14, Eva and Andrew King stopped by the Center on their way to an annual field meet of the Virginia Falconers’ Association.  Peregrine Falcon #10-2118 was traveling with them, of course, so the Wildlife Center staff got a chance to see the bird on Eva’s glove.  She seemed quite at home!  On January 18, Center staff checked with Eva to see how things went this weekend: 

Eva writes:

There are a couple of noteworthy things to report:

1) We have been able to identify her subspecies and age!

We took the peregrine to our annual field meet of the Virginia Falconers’ Association (VFA) in Harrisonburg this past weekend and introduced her to a few other Virginia falconers. With the help of Bill Harry, founding member of the VFA with over 40 years of falconry experience and a true falcon expert, we managed to identify the peregrine’s subspecies and age. We would like to thank Bill Harry for his invaluable input!

She is not a Tundra Peregrine, but a member of the re-introduced “anatum” strain that was rebuilt over the past 40 years using internationally sourced peregrine falcons.

This identification may be important in determining the best location for her release further down the line. Tundra peregrines live far north all the way up into Canada and Arctic areas, whereas the “anatum” has a much wider distribution. 

The true Eastern anatum peregrine does no longer exist in its original form, because populations collapsed in the 1960s and 70s due to wide-spread DDT use. Over the course of the past 40 years, falconers world-wide played a vital role in identifying this population collapse and worked closely with wildlife agencies to rebuild wild peregrine falcon populations using falconry breeding stocks. Falconers also worked hard to ensure that the captive-bred and released peregrine falcons were able to survive and thrive in the wild. All this work combined with the prohibition of DDT has paid off, and nowadays wild peregrine falcon populations continue to recover nicely.

As for her age, she is in her second year. Peregrine Falcons start changing the plumage color on their back and wings from dark brown to slate-grey starting with their first molt. This falcon still has some remaining brown feathers mixed in with the predominant slate-grey. We can therefore tell that she is in her second year of life. Had she been all slate-grey, we would only be able to say that she is at least two years old. But “at least 2 years” can be anything from two to 20!
 
2) When we worked with the falcon on Monday night [January 17], we had a bit of a break-through:

She consistently flew to the fist for her entire food ration with much less hesitation than she had previously. By the end of yesterday’s training session, she had flown to the fist and back to her indoor perch 12 times over a distance that required her to do six wing beats each way. We are very encouraged by this development!

January 6 update

At the end of December, falconers Eva and Andrew King hit an unusual snag with the Peregrine Falcon.  The bird suddenly seemed to lose her interest in food after weeks of eating chicks, quail, and mice with gusto. 

Eva reports:

On December 30, we noted that the peregrine lost a significant amount of weight compared to the day before, despite being offered plenty of food. This is very unusual and worrying in raptors.  We immediately put all training on hold and took her back indoors to keep her warm, quiet, and comfortable.  We also tried to coax her into eating as much food as she would take down.

The eating part took a lot of effort and coaxing. She had no enthusiasm for food, was very picky and on one occasion even regurgitated part of her meal.  By January 1, the falcon also became very quiet and looked sleepy. We became very worried about her.

We immediately contacted Dr. Dave that same day and told him about the situation. We then took the falcon into the Wildlife Center to see Dr. Kelly on New Year’s Day. She examined her and took samples to check for infection and her general health status. 

The exam indicated that she most likely did not have an infection, but her blood work looked like that of a thin, anemic bird, which just did not make a lot of sense.  She had been getting huge amounts of food in the previous days.  By loads of food, I mean ~20% of her body weight in high-quality meat every day! (Imagine: You would be eating ~30 pounds of meat a day!) But somehow, all that nutrition did not seem to “stick to her ribs”. 

Kelly gave her lots of subcutaneous fluids and an iron supplement before we took the Peregrine Falcon back home.  We continued to give her as much top-quality food as we could possibly get her to eat, while letting her rest and recover.

The good news is that we noticed a difference very shortly thereafter! The falcon started to perk up the following day and has been steadily improving since. As of January 4, she is now eating with appetite again, has gained some weight, and her chest feels much rounder than it did just a few days ago. She also is more active, jumps around, shows intense interest in her environment, and overall seems to “feel her oats” again. 

This morning before work, she ate 4 chicks, flew back to her hallway perch (her favorite spot) off the fist after weighing, and has been sitting in her car seat while I’m in the office. I just checked on her again and also felt her chest: she’s rounder than she was, even though the total weight hasn’t changed much in the past day.

As a follow-up, Dr. Dave is going to take samples again on January 6. We’ll then see if whatever was wrong with her is truly behind us now. Maybe we can even figure out what caused this strange episode in the first place.

December 28 update from Eva King

We hope you all had a good time over the holidays!  We are excited to give you our “Holiday Update” on Peregrine Falcon #10-2118:
 
Since our last post, the girl has graduated to the next training stage: doing a little bit of work for her food. She is now consistently flying/jumping to the fist over a distance of six to seven feet to get bits of food. We have also introduced her to the lure, which is the training tool she will eventually chase in free flight.

Right now her lesson has the theme of “good things (i.e. safety and food) happen when you are on the glove, but the lure really is where the big portions come from.” At this point, the lure is not swung around yet, but just presented to her and she hops to it. She is still getting familiar with the idea. We have also started to put her outside in the mews [outdoor raptor housing], under supervision for a few hours at a time. This increases her sensory input and kicks up her metabolism. She is out in the weather and is more active in the mews than on her perch in the house. All this increases her appetite, which in turn gives us more training opportunities, as we have a mostly food-driven relationship.

A bit of Falconry 101 for the day:- The lure is a leather pad on a line with meat attached to it. It is swung in the air at high speeds to simulate a bird in flight.  Lures can be highly artistic, beautifully-crafted objects, designed to actually resemble the prey a falcon is being trained to pursue.

- Did you know that falconry is an ancient art with more than 4000 years of documented history?  Surprisingly, lots of the equipment and basic techniques we use today have not changed all that much over the centuries and are mostly the same all over the world!  We are excited that United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) recently recognized falconry as “Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.”  

For now, we wish you all a Happy New Year and look forward to giving you our next update soon!

December 20 update from Eva King

The Peregrine Falcon is doing very well.  We began working with her on December 13 — the same night that Dr. Dave McRuer dropped her off with us. 

The first part of this process is getting her comfortable around us, and build her trust in us.  This is an essential first step before we can do any flight training and conditioning. In falconry, we call this part “manning” and it basically involves getting the bird used to us, establishing that we are no danger to her, and that good things happen when she’s around us.  The falcon learns that being around us means easy food opportunities in a safe environment. 

This first part of the training process can go very quickly or can take a while, depending on the individual bird.  We have experienced birds that are totally relaxed around us and have “gotten the idea” within just a day, while others have taken up to a week.

The falcon is now sitting on the fist (on the falconer’s glove) comfortably and trusts us well enough to bend down to eat her food off the glove.  That may not sound like much, but is actually a pretty big deal, because she has to take her eyes off the falconer to bend all the way down to the food at her feet.  That takes courage on her part, and she’s doing it consistently now.  She’s also fine with sitting on her perch, and her body-language tells us she is getting increasingly relaxed with her new living arrangement.

In a couple of days, we expect to start making the bird do a little bit of work for her food.  That starts with asking her to stretch just a bit for food.  Next we’ll get her to do a little hop, then she’ll do bigger and bigger hops until we graduate to free-flying outside.  But that is still probably a few weeks down the line.

Questions and Answers with Eva King

What are the particular challenges of working with this bird?

Because this falcon is an adult bird that is somewhat more set in her ways than a juvenile bird would be, and also she currently associates humans with being handled and treated medically (which to her is somewhat traumatic), the time it takes for her to trust us and get used to the procedure could be expected to take a little longer than normal.  But she’s still doing very well!   

Assuming that the bird will be released, how will it know to stop coming to humans for food?  How exactly does it “revert” to being a wild bird?

When talking about the initial training process, it is important not to confuse “manning” with “imprinting.”  A bird that has grown up in the wild will never imprint on humans.  They will also never become dependent on us, and they revert back to a totally wild stage very quickly.  So, once they have been released back to wild, they will not look back and will not come to humans for food.  They go right back to looking after themselves.

In falconry, we work with both wild and captive-bred raptors.  All the wild Red-tailed Hawks that we have worked with were released again after the officially regulated hawking season, which ends in spring.  We work with them as a hunting team every single day throughout the fall and winter.  They fly freely a minimum of once a day and have the opportunity to leave if they want to. If falconers do a good job, the hawks generally don’t leave, because they know they’ve got a good deal going.

Once the hunting season is over, we reduce contact times while maximizing their food rations for a couple of days before sending them on their way (the falconry term for that is “to feed up”).  As strange as that may sound, that is all it takes for them to take off and never look back.  They never become dependent on us at all.  One of “our” red-tails set up his own territory a few miles down the road.  We watched him for the next two years while he found a partner and raised three young the following year.

So, once this Peregrine Falcon is ready and in good flying condition, we will do the same thing:  ”feed her up” and let her go her own way again.

What happens if the bird flies away?  Will there be any way to track her?

We do fly our birds with radio transmitters during the training period so we can track them if they get confused and land somewhere out of our sight.  But these transmitters only have a range of two to four miles and a few days of battery life.  So, they are not suitable for long-term or long-distance tracking after release.  Having said that, things do happen and birds do fly away at times when we may not have planned for it to happen.

If the Peregrine Falcon decides to fly out of the two- to four-mile tracking range before the planned release date, she has shown us that she’s capable of flying well enough to be fine by herself and then that is just the way it will be.  She will take off the equipment by herself very quickly and it will not hinder her in any way.  This falcon has already shown that she is exceptionally skilled at taking off equipment–she’s a bit of a “Houdini.”  She keeps us on our toes for sure!

Because the Peregrine Falcon was injured during her migration, will she be able to be released when she is healed?  Or will the falconers have to keep her through the winter?

As for timing, we think it’s probably best to keep her until spring, no matter how fit she is beforehand.  She was caught mid-migration and should technically be somewhere nice and warm at the moment.  It makes sense for her to stay in a more comfortable environment until she would naturally come back this way again.

The Wildlife Center is very excited to explore this new relationship with Eva and Andrew.  We’ll be in close touch with them in the coming weeks to receive occasional updates on the Peregrine Falcon.  The Wildlife Center gratefully acknowledges the Virginia Falconers’ Association for providing food for the peregrine during her stay with Eva and Andrew.

PLEASE TELL US WHAT YOU’D LIKE TO KNOW! If you have any specific questions about the falconry training process, please submit them to outreach@wildlifecenter.org … and we’ll pass them along to our expert falconers.

Additional information about the medical care of Peregrine Falcon #10-2118 at the Wildlife Center of Virginia

The Wildlife Center relies on the support of individual to provide health care to more than 2,200 patients — ranging from Deer Mice and Virginia Opossums to Bald Eagles and Peregrine Falcons.  Please help!