Saturday, June 27, 2009

Clinic Update

The ward has been pretty busy for the last few weeks. With only the two managers, interns, occasional help by students on rotation and a handful of additional volunteers, there is a lot to do over the summer! As always there are some pretty interesting cases, including:

Snapping Turtle
Snapping turtle
Orphaned Groundhog
baby groundhog
Juvenile Cooper's Hawk
juvie coopers tx
Turtle with a Shell Fracture
This turtle presented with a significant shell fracture. We've attempted to surgically wire the shell back together. Turtles heal slowly, but these shell fracture repair surgeries are often successful. Turtle shells are made of bone, and if realigned correctly, will heal similar to any other broken bone.
During Surgery
turtle sx
After Surgery
turtle after sx

Saturday, June 13, 2009

Yankee Ridge Educational Event

Before school let out for the summer, two of our resident raptors visited the students at Yankee Ridge Elementary school. Nokomis and Odin visited an art class so the students could practice drawing live subjects. It was a really interesting opportunity for both the birds and the artists!

You can read more about the event here. (Scroll down... the story is toward the bottom of the page.)

yankee ridge
yankee ridge
yankee ridge
The raptors will be at the Springer Cultural Center for the Champaign Park District Summer Day Camp on June 19th and at the Rantoul Public Library at 1pm on June 27th. Stop by and say "hello!"

Clinic Update

Summer is always a busy time in the WMC, and right now there are a few interesting cases in the clinic.

First, there is a Great Blue Heron with a left wing injury.
great blue heron
great blue heron

We also have a very vocal juvenile Red-tailed Hawk.
juvie redtail

This turtle needed to have a feeding tube placed to make sure he gets enough nutrients.
feeding tube turtle

As always, there are a lot of juvenile animals in the ward over the summer. Thus far there have been 12 fawns! This one is recovering in an incubator after being hit by a car.
fawn HBC