Ricky Update!

Greetings folks!
Hope everyone has kept warm these past couple of days. It seems February is trying to remind us it's still winter here in the Western Hemisphere! Good amount of snow at the higher elevations, but the valley was spared the fluffy goodness. In this blog we're going to catch you up on Ricky, the Barred Ow.

We took the Ricky, the Barred Owl with the wing injury resulting from a run in with a barbed wire fence, to see the vet. The vet said the wing looks very good, no necrosis (dead tissue), and the owl is using the wing very well. There were a few small holes that were sutured closed, and they also look great! Ricky has to stay inside during the cold winter nights as it will lose a lot of body heat where the feathers are missing, but it can enjoy the sunshine during the warm days! We are ecstatic at the progress this owl has made - such a trooper!

When raptors have as many feathers damaged or missing like our Barred Owl (Ricky) we have two choices. Number one we can wait until the bird molts, which means its naturally grows in new feathers on its own. Number two we can imp in new feathers, which is taking feathers from another bird and attaching them for the injured bird to use till its own grow in (much more difficult than it may sound). The extent of damage for these two raptors is too great and in the wrong location to imp, so we will have to let the new ones grow in, and then evaluate their flight.

We'd like to give a big thanks to Clinch River Raptor Center for letting us use their flight pen for Roscoe the Great Horned Owl!

I hope everyone is enjoying keeping a watchful eye on all our current patients! Should there be any questions about anything at all please feel free to drop us a comment, or shoot us an email. One of our main goals is to help educate the general public about raptors, and what we do! Again thank you for your support!

Excited,
Upstate Birds of Prey