Tom Sweets, executive director of the Key West Wildlife Center, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5 FM this morning to talk about what’s happening at the center.
It’s important to remember that while sometimes birds look like they’re hurt, it’s not always the case.
Sweets said, “That’s a timely topic for right now, with our rescue activities. I can tell you we’ve been experiencing this recently. We’ve actually got two great blue herons that are up on the Sugarloaf area and both of them, they have different injuries. The first one, I was called up there a week ago, and the bird has a very bad drooping wing, it looks like he has a broken wing when you see him. But as I approached, he was able to raise his wings and fly. So this first great blue heron, what the situation is, is I think some of the muscles that actually help the bird fold the wing in and hold it up when he’s not in flight when he’s on the ground, those are injured or were injured and that does happen. We get birds that fly into wires, sometimes they’ll get hit by cars, those are the main things, but this bird was actually able to fly without a problem. So at that point, you have to start taking into consideration if the bird can fly, then the bird should be able to do everything it needs to do. The herons wade in the water, they do fly around their areas where they hunt. When the wing is drooping like that, you might see it and feel concerned. But actually, if the bird can fly, then we would just rather give it some time and see what happens with it. Because trying to rescue a bird like that, it’s a stressful thing to rescue a bird, using a net or net gun and we could easily injure that bird worse in a situation like that. So we’re backing off on that bird. We get calls about this bird every day, this great blue heron, and he’s going to different properties and he’s moving around and he’s doing his thing. So in that case, we don’t want to do anything too invasive to this bird. Rescuing them can sometimes put them at risk. If they’re already injured, it can injure them more.”
In the same area, there’s a second great blue heron that has an old fractured leg.
Sweets said, “It’s an old fracture that has healed and even part of the bone is exposed, but the wound has sealed around it. There’s no more bleeding, there’s no more problems. It’s just an old wound. The leg doesn’t really work all that well. But, we had someone call and say, you need to rescue this bird and amputate the leg. Well, we can’t amputate the leg. It’s against our state and federal permits above a certain point. The problem is for a heron to fly, they need to be balanced and if you take away the majority of one leg, he’s not going to be balanced either on the ground or in flight. So that’s another case of an old injury that’s healed and yes, the bird may not be 100%. But this heron is able to do everything he needs to do. He can go out, he can still forage in the shallows. He can forage along the shoreline, and he’s still flighted. So that’s another example where people are concerned, which I think is great and people are calling about these birds, which is great. But I think people do need to understand that not every injury is going to be something that we want to really go aggressively at the bird and do too invasive of a rescue.”
What do the silver bands on birds mean?
Sweets said, “The silver band, they do that when they’re very young, when they are in the nest still, they will do banding. The silver band usually means that the Pelican was born in the Carolinas. So that’s what we usually see. We do have brown pelicans with leg injuries and in they do limp. Another good example, what I would say is, if you see an open wound, or if you see blood, if you see something that looks like it’s a fresh wound, then yes, we certainly would be interested in looking at that bird. But it’s just like people. People have limps. People survive quite well with limps or with other injuries that they get throughout life and a lot of these birds have the same situations. They will injure themselves, and then they will heal and our take is that as long as they are able to do what they need to do, as long as it’s not something that is going to become infected, an actively bleeding wound are a fresh wound. In those situations, yes, we can actually do something, we can rescue the bird, we can treat the wounds so that they’re not going to get any worse. But a bird that’s been out there in the wild and has an old wound that’s healed, and they’re still able to do what they can do and survive. Some of these birds have been treated and released, but unless it’s a very special species like when we had the flamingo, the American Flamingo or maybe a bald eagle, generally, we’re not going to do any banding. Those are usually done for population measures at birth, so that they can track the bird throughout its life and we do report those. When we rescue a bird that’s got a band, then we report it to the national database and then they add that to the to the birds history.”
Songbird season is upon us.
Sweets said, “We’re just getting into the spring migration. It’s already started. Some of them do start a little bit early. So we will be seeing those warblers, all those warblers and songbirds coming back north, from the south, they’re going to go up and then start building nests and get the next generation of birds going. Now we do have some local birds that have already started nesting, too. Some of our doves, pigeons. We’ve actually had a couple of mourning dove fledglings just recently that were rescued and that’s always a timely thing, too. When a baby bird leaves the nest in fledges, they are going to spend time on the ground and that’s normal and natural. The pigeons and doves are pretty much just going to sit on their own on the ground without moving. That’s how they tried to stay camouflaged and our northern mockingbirds, our grackles, our songbirds, they’re going to be hopping around and making all kinds of noise and the parents will still be looking out for them. They do during this period, it’s a short period, usually a few days that they spend on the ground before they’re fully flighted and then they will be up in the trees with the parents.”
The new clinic at the Key West Wildlife Center is underway, but there is still a need for support.
Sweets said, “Our capital campaign for our new building is definitely underway. We’re getting very close to our total of $2.4 million to get the new clinic and then to have our aviary refurbished. We appreciate all the support people are giving. Every donation going to that is going to help us have a new state of the art facility, as opposed to our current one, which has really seen a lot of use over the years and is getting a little threadbare. We just had our big fundraiser last weekend and I just want to say thank you for everyone that came out and made it so successful for us. The community support here is great, and we love serving that community and we look forward to continue doing that in our new building, which we should be breaking ground in just a month or two from now, if everything goes according to schedule.”
Is there any effect on the bird population as a result of what’s been going on in the fish population?
Sweets said, “It’s quite a situation that we’re going through. I know a lot of people are out there studying the situation now. There are resources that you can contact for the sawfish, for stingrays, rays or fish. Those numbers are available, I’ll post them on our website and also through our social media. We’ve had a couple of brown pelicans that were exhibiting toxicity issues, that passed away soon after we rescued them. We have sent one of those birds off to the state to FWC to do some testing. Whenever we see something that might be related, we’re getting a lot of this activity up around Big Coppitt, in the canals in that area. We are definitely looking out for birds that are exhibiting any type of toxicity and we are working with the state to try to get questionable birds tested as we go forward. It’s great to have everybody aware, everybody out there. I know that the state and FWC really wants to know where the hotspots are, because they are working to try to discover what’s actually going on.”
The rescue number is 305-292-1008 and the center is available 24 hours for rescue.
For more information on the center, click here: https://keywestwildlifecenter.org/