Happy Weekend Everybody!

We’ve had a busy last couple of days at our hospital. After a thorough check-up with a veterinarian that specializes in avian medicine, our Lesser Scaup was deemed healthy and ready for release. Although he had a steel pellet lodged in his side from this past duck-hunting season, our vet ensured us that the pellet would not interfere with his flight, and that many birds live with pellets in their bodies for their whole lives. We decided not to wait another day to release our Scaup, who has been in the custody of various animal hospitals since mid-January.

When we release any animal, we make sure that there are other animals of the same species in the area. This is especially important with birds which need to join a flock. We took a short trip to a pond in Oyster Bay where we discovered many male and female Lesser Scaup, as well as Buffleheads, Canada Geese, Mallards, and Mute Swans. This was the perfect spot for our Scaup! We went straight back to our hospital and released our little guy right away. He was very excited to go and quickly integrated himself with some other Scaup buddies.

We also released an Eastern Grey Squirrel that had been with us since September. We admit many orphaned baby squirrels every year, which we must raise on our own and then release once they are old enough. In order for our squirrels to properly acclimate to the wild, we release squirrels in places where we can provide food and shelter for them for as long as they need it. This is called “soft releasing” and is a common technique used by wildlife rehabilitators. Since I released the squirrel in my yard, I had a squirrel nestbox set up in a tree and a plethora of food ready for her for the next couple of weeks. Many squirrels move on to another home after only a couple of days, and some take much longer than that. When they decide to leave really depends on the squirrel!

Other events of note include a program we did on Sunday, February 5th about the winter adaptations of mammals. Our program featured our permanent Virginia Opossum siblings Martin and Millie, as well as Wyatt, our permanent Eastern Grey Squirrel. The program was followed by a fun and educational hike through Bailey Arboretum with Dan Kreisberg.