See How They Grow!

One of the great things about volunteering at Wolf Hollow, especially during "baby season", is watching the baby...whatevers....develop into adult...whatevers. The mergies (mergansers) we got in are a perfect example.

As a refresher, here is how they looked when they came in a few months ago. Here is the Hooded merganser baby with his mallard swim buddy along with the, up until recently, unidentifiable merganser baby. Much debate has ensued over the past few months regarding what type of merganser he is....Common or Red-breasted:

Then they got big enough to go outside to one of the covered wet tubs.

It seemed like their beaks doubled in length literally overnight! So, they stayed in this tub for awhile, practically living in their swim tub.

See how much they have developed in just a week? After being in the tub for a few weeks, they finally graduated to the Wet Pen!

Bigger bird size means bigger bird food! There is quite the initial rush to the food bowls to see who can inhale the most smelt!


The mallard was released a week ago and the mergansers should be ready for release within the next week or so.

UFO ALERT!

This Unidentifiable Furless Object was found on someone's doorstep. While we knew it was a rodent of some kind, we just didn't know WHICH rodent species it was. And honestly, I don't think very many of us expected it to make it through the night, considering how young it obviously was. But make it, it did. And you know what? When it squeaked for food, the chipmunks FREAKED OUT! So, I immediately figured it was either a baby chipmunk or a predator of some kind. But it was just a waiting game to see if it would live long enough for us to unravel the mystery. I mean, feeding it was nigh on impossible!

Any guesses? Come on...what rodent is tough as nails? Yep.....TADA!!

I just love rats and had one as a pet when I was younger. And this one is a cutie!

Speaking of the chipmunks, they, too, grew up and have been released. Here's a few photos, some of which have been posted before, of that process:


It was a week after I took this last picture that I observed an Oedipal-type act occurring in the tank, at which point, after being observed by Serena, they were declared old enough for release. She then left the room, muttering the whole while under her breath that until such time that they were released she hoped the more delicate sensibilities of some of the younger interns wouldn't be offended!

Look at THIS beauty!

This fox kit was captured by our local airport people after they saw it running around on the tarmac. After they captured it, they found the skeleton of a larger fox nearby that looked like it had been dead for at least a week. We are assuming that was his mother. Upon examination, and I'm sure this comes as no surprise, he was very thin. This also was evident by how he ate his food. Foxes are hoarders and even the blonde fox would take half of her meat pieces and bury them in the dirt or hide them in her house she slept in. Not this guy!

He ate EVERYTHING and in record time as well! On a sad note, at the same time I was feeding him, I gave the blonde fox her food as well. It was at this time that I noticed that her head was turned, permanently, to the right...sharply to the right. At first I thought she was blind, but she could definitely see me. Unfortunately, I guess head traumas can clear up and then BAM! the animal can go right back to square one, which is exactly what happened with her. So after having her for two months and with NO improvement a week after her relapse, they euthanized her.

Can you really call a bird a fledgling if it can't fly?

This Cliff swallow youngster was found on Orcas. And boy are his feathers a MESS! Plus, if you look closely, you will notice that he has a bald lower back! He's definitely one of those cases that comes in and we scratch our heads and say "What the hey?!"

Our long term "head scratcher" case study is still doing fine and has been moved to an outdoor mew.

I, along with others I think, am hoping the sunshine and fresh air will do him some good, feather growing-wise that is!

We have in 19 seals....

and TWENTY baby raccoons!!!!

But I have saved THE COOLEST animal for last. Meet our Hoary bat!

Now, my love of bats has been well documented throughout this blog, but I must say this is the most amazing bat we have ever had in while I have been volunteering there! He is at least twice the size of the Little Brown bats we have had in and he just seems to have more character. We initially tried feeding him mealworms, like we did with the other bats, but he was not having ANY of THAT! So then we defrosted some bloodworms and VOILA!

Yep, he LOVED them! So much so in fact that he got all pissey when we stopped feeding him and went to put him back!

That's it for now. We have such a variety of animals in that it is almost overwhelming trying to decide on which ones to write about. So I will write about the ones that didn't make the cut for this posting next time, including a big move for our fawns! Til next time...

WCB: Happy Birthday Riley!!!

Yes, I know I tout this as a Wolf Hollow blog and haven't done a WH post in awhile, but I did want to send out birthday greetings to my not-so-baby-anymore boy Riley. I can't believe it was a year ago that I had given up hope of a friend's cat having an orange and white boy kitten only to have her tell me that night that the last kitten born was an orange and white male and was mine if I wanted him. YEAH I WANTED HIM! And then they sent me this:

Here he is, not even a day old. Who knew this sweet, helpless exterior held the soul of a rabble-rouser? I know I didn't! And now for a quick photo montage of his past year:

Riley at 6 weeks

Riley at 9 weeks

Riley at 6 months-One can see the mischievous glint in his eye.

Riley at 8 months-He likes to help me pic out photos for my blog!

Riley as he is today. He's a big, sweet boy who brings a lot of life to this house and I can't imagine my life without him. Thanks, Susan, for giving me such a precious gift. I just adore him!

For those of you who like cat blogging, check out the Weekend Cat Blogging folks at Sher's website.

Til next time...

Wait for It.......

It's coming....I PROMISE! Til next time...

Hahahahahaha.....

This little, or not so little, guy is actually a Red-tailed hawk nestling. The problem? He should be a FLEDGLING! The down he is covered with is not baby bird down, but the down you would find under feathers. While he has these little grey feather-like things that have come in all higgeldy-piggeldy like on his head and shoulders, he has no MAJOR feathers, or what are technically called blood feathers, coming in. And we have no idea why. Outside of that, he appears to be healthy and he has a voracious appetite! He has got to be one of the oddest, and in my book cutest, young birds we have gotten in.

Wouldn't you agree? I promise to do a more complete post later in the week, but it's late, it's still really warm in my place, and I still have to wash my dog. Til next time...

A Week in Review

Til next time...

Let Me Start Out by Saying....

that no, the wee one didn't make it. That teeny thing was less than a day old when we got it in and we just haven't learned how to do as good a job as "mom" can in these early stages. Let's go check out some newer residents of good ol' Wolf Hollow!

Now, I went off-island last Saturday but did come back that afternoon and dropped by to see what I had missed. The first thing Serena asked me when I walked in the door was if I had brought my camera, to which I replied that I hadn't. To that she said, "Too bad, because the baby Townsend's chipmunks are being fed." The baby WHATS?!!

Uh...yeah. Can it be ANY cuter? Can it?! And we have FOUR of them! And how does one feed such a tiny thing? Veeeery carefully....

These are THE SMALLEST mammals we have had in since I have been there. Okay, there was one exception, and that was this tiny thing.

It's a baby vole that we had in the first month I was there at Wolf Hollow. Unfortunately it didn't make it, but the chipmunks seem to be doing well, so I am keeping my fingers crossed!

We have in not one but two fox kits, one of which was hit by a car and one that was the victim of a dog attack. We have Red Foxes here on the island, but they have different color phases, namely red and black. So lets start with the black kit.

If you think he looks miserable, that's because he is. He was found on the side of a road here on SJI after a dog had attacked him. His mom and litter mates were nearby. It appears that the dog had picked him up by the shoulders and shook him, breaking his right front leg at the humeral head. At the time this picture was taken, he had no deep pain response in the lower part of his leg, but they are hoping that he will regain that after the surgery he had this past Tuesday. Guess I will find out on Saturday.

The other little fox kit is one of the red/pseudo red phase. Now, I have seen a fox near South Beach that wasn't red or black, but a very interesting shade of brown. I have only seen it twice but this little girl could be related.

As you can see, she is leaning heavily against Serena's legs. This is because she is having major issues standing upright. The fact that she is even alive to try to stand upright is somewhat of a miracle. Our wonderful Educational Coordinator Shona, and her wonderful husband Ross, were out driving and saw her lying by the side of the road. They assumed she was dead but decided to stop and make sure. She was cold, but sure enough she moved a tiny bit when they touched her. So in she came to WH. Shona told me that she honestly thought they were just making her comfortable before she died. So BOY was she surprised the next morning when she came in and was told that she was awake and sitting up! That's a really good lesson folks. Unless the animal is OBVIOUSLY dead, and I don't think I need to go into any type of graphic detail when I use that term, you should try and check the animal, as it may just be in shock or unconscious, like this beauty was.

She had obviously been hit by a car and while she has no fractures, she does have neurological damage and as such is being given a steroid to help reduce whatever neurological inflammation she may have. To this end, she has to be supported and her water and food need to be placed right under her nose before she tries it.

Now, they seemed to also think that she might not be seeing too well out of either eye, so she is still in a precarious situation and I honestly don't know if she will still be there on Saturday. I hope she is!

We got in a Merganser baby. I just LOVE these guys, as they look like cartoon baby ducks. This one was found at our local sewer plant all by its lonesome. It gets to swim a bit every day in the sink and we try and put in one of the mallard ducklings with it, as one should always swim with a buddy!

The fawn with the weird bony jaw protuberance is back inside. It developed diarrhea and while that is getting somewhat better, it has now developed a hole at the end of the bony projection.

Yeah, it's not the best picture, as he was all over the place. But you get the idea. They are taking a culture of it to see if there might be some fungal or bacterial thing going on there, and therefore figure out the best way to treat it. And as you can see, by the way he is gnawing on Serena's gloved finger, he definitely has a good appetite. In fact, for the second time EVER, here is a video clip of this bottomless pit draining his bottle in under 15 seconds.

We also got this fawn in and it's just a mess. I call it the "snotty" fawn, and here's why.

See? I told you it was a mess. It was found wandering along a road. It has multiple wounds/tears around the face, its left eye is swollen shut with pus, its nose is swollen, and to top it all off, it has an upper respiratory infection. Needless to say it's on antibiotics and an anti-bacterial eye ointment. It's so bad that anyone touching the poor miserable thing must don a gown and gloves. Yeegs!

Let's wrap up this posting on a good note. The five fawns we have outside, including the piebald one, are all doing great. Going out and feeding them is funny, as they are all just frantic to get at the bottles, sometimes the same one!

See, there's our little girl shoving her way in there. She's no pushover! After they are done they meander off into the trees, or towards the photographer, if one happens to be present.

Til next time...