Padawan

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Padawan

From Illinois Raptor Center

From that day forward - Wampa was known as Darth Nyctea .....

Wampa - one of two Snowy Owls in the IRC educational program received his yearly exam the other day and he looked soooooooo Jedi (or sith) wrapped up in his towel.

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Bonus Content

Overflowing Freezer (not graphic, but dead prey warning)

THANK YOU to Two Dollar Tuesday (TDT) donors and all the other generous donors we have received gifts from, our birds are now staring down a strategic reserve of rodents so no one will be going hungry when the Great Horned Owl chicks start arriving next month! Somewhere, an American Kestrel is drafting a thank- you note and an owl is already planning dinner for the next month and a half.

Let's be clear: Even at 95 cents each, mice are not glamorous. This is not Instagram-pretty. This is mission-critical protein procurement.

Frozen mice don't show up on inspirational posters. They don't sparkle. They don't sing or dance. But they keep raptors alive, healthy, and doing what raptors do best - being absolute apex professionals.

And here's the punchline: small donations made this very large, very heavy, very real thing happen. Two dollars at a time - $5.00 at a time - "I can't give much, but I care" at a time.

So if you've ever wondered if a small donation actually does anything - I can tell you - Yes it certainly does!

It's amazing what happens when tiny 31-34 gram frozen mice, like $2 donations, come together. Individually, they're insignificant. Collectively, they become 350 pounds of rodent in a box, delivered to our wildlife hospital by a slightly winded FedEx driver who will forever have bragging rights for carrying more mice on his shoulders than any human ever should.

This is what Two Dollar Tuesday looks like in real life. On behalf of the birds and Jane (who are thrilled) and the volunteers and Beth (who are rearranging freezers like a game of frozen Tetris):

Thank you for feeding the mission........Literally!

That is a lot of meals! While most of you would probably not enjoy this sight in your own freezers, if I got back to the clinic when they bring us back in March and saw this scene, I would be thrilled!

I learned my new job had a charity matching program, so I quickly maxed that out at Christmas to get a nice bonus for my animals come springtime! We've got a lot of aviary building to do, and I hear talk we'll be accepting waterfowl again also, so we need all the resources we can get!

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Curious why they need to eat mice. Isn't there a cheaper source of protein?

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OP

Things like raptors or snakes that swallow prey whole do so to get complete nutrition. Feeding them something like chicken breast for example, only would provide the nutritional content of lean muscle protein. They wouldn't be getting calcium from the bones, minerals from the different organs, fats from skin, and the water content from the whole body. Each body part holds specific things that are needed for the predators (and the prey when it was alive) to survive. So the simplest way to feed them is to feed them as close as possible to how they'd eat in the wild.

I don't feed all the carnivores we have just mice though. Each animal is getting a customized nutritional plan based on their species, weight, and current state of health. We have baby chickens and baby quails and other whole animals we can give them. And some mainly eat fish, so we occasionally need to stock whole fish as well. We just need to keep them functioning as close to how they would in the wild as is feasible.

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Makes sense. Thank you.

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OP

My pleasure! I like getting questions.

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You don't need to see his micedentification

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