Purple Gallinule

One of our first birds of 2002 was also one of the rarest. On January 16, a woman drove by what first looked like a chunk of dark ice in a road near Spruce Head. Something made her turn around and go back and take a closer look -- it was a bird! Her husband, a competent birder and member of mid-coast Audubon, correctly identified it as a Purple Gallinule and brought it to us the next morning. The Purple Gallinule is a fresh-water wetland species that sometimes strays from its gulf-coast territory. The keeper of Maine's bird records told us that this particular species hadn't been seen in Maine in a decade. We wish we could show you a full-body color photo of a species for which the term "gaudy" would be an understatement: this bird is not only purple but also deep blue and green, with red, yellow and sky-blue trim (check it out in your field guide!).

This bird's humerus had a nasty fracture close to the elbow -- not a good prognosis. On January 19, our nimble-fingered veterinarian managed to get a pin through the fracture. When the pin was removed ten days later, the callus around the fracture was holding, and Marc started physical therapy a few days later. He worked with the wing through the better part of March, but the bird did not regain sufficient flight capacity for release. We arranged for this bird to become a permanent guest of the Virginia Marine Science Museum, a facility with an awesome enclosed wetland aviary. On May 9, one of our staff members drove the bird to a stop-over at Tri-State Bird Rescue & Research in Delaware; from there, another driver completed the journey to Virginia.

Great Horned Owl

On February 21, 2002, we admitted a Great Horned Owl that had been captured in the duck pen of a family in Hartland. The bird was very thin and obviously desperate for food. Normally this species captures food with its talons, but this bird had a hugely swollen and infected foot. We started the bird on antibiotics, and a couple days later, we thought the bird had stabilized enough to begin working on the foot. Foot infections in Raptors are very difficult to treat. It took nearly two months for this one to heal. Over that period, we did daily foot soaks, and packed the foot with drawing salves and poultices as recommended by herbalists on our staff. Our veterinarian and Marc did several major clean-outs of pus. The vet also suggested homeopathic remedies as treatment progressed to facilitate the healing process. By the end of April, the foot was definitely on the mend, and the bird climbed onto a perch for the first time on May 8. Two weeks later, the incisions had healed, and we moved the bird out to the flight cage. She was released on June 4.

On February 16, 2001, we got a call from Acadia Dispatch about a Great-Horned Owl that was on the ground. Normally, Acadia Wildlife Foundation on Mt. Desert would have been contacted, but our colleague Ann was away on vacation, and her answering machine had directed the dispatcher to us. The Owl had porcupine quills all over her face and feet; she was emaciated, and so debilitated that we almost lost her that afternoon, while we removed over 200 quills under general anesthesia. Over the next week we removed quite a few more, and also treated her for parasites and a lesion in her mouth. But by the end of that week she was standing and eating solid food. After that, she gained weight rapidly. We gave her to Ann for release in her home territory on March 24.

Kestrel nestlings

Kestrel ready to release

The first day of a Unity College student's internship was one that set the stage for much of his summer in 2002. On June 7, a wounded American Kestrel was found on the ground near the Unity Depot. The man who rescued her put her in his lunch pail while he waited for our intern Mike to drive over to get her. When Mike picked her up, he found that she had laid an egg in the pail, so he brought the egg back as well. Though we immediately popped the egg into our new incubator, it was not fertile and did not hatch. Mom had no fractures, but the wound to her chest had compromised some of her flight muscles; it would be another five weeks before she flew for the first time.

But meanwhile, there had been some other developments; knowing that we had a potential foster-parent, a rehabilitator colleague had transferred two Kestrel nestlings that had just opened their eyes. Over the next several weeks, four more Kestrel youngsters arrived, and their adopted mother taught them the ropes. By mid-August, they were grown up and ready to release; Mike let them go on the last day of his internship. We held mom back; she was still favoring one wing. But a week later, she was flying so strongly that Marc decided it was time. He took her to the site where her foster-children had been released; when he let her go, she was immediately joined by one of them.

Lead-poisoned Loon

Loon X-ray showing sinker

Each year, we admit several Common Loons with lead poisoning. These birds apparently mistake lost sinkers on lake-bottoms for pebbles that are just the right size to help their gizzards grind up their food. But the gizzard promptly grinds lead off the sinker; it eventually makes its way into the blood stream and organs such as the liver and kidneys. Almost always, by the time a Loon with lead poisoning is weak enough to be retrieved, too much damage had been done to vital systems for any treatment to be successful. This sad-eyed lady died a few hours after the accompanying x-ray (showing the sinker in her gizzard) was taken. Lead poisoning from the ingestion of lead sinkers and jigs is the leading cause of death for adult Loons in Maine; as of January 1, 2002, the State of Maine has banned the sale of lead sinkers weighing ½ oz or less.

Another Loon was also a victim of lost fishing gear. On August 5, 2002, we were contacted by the Camden Police Department. There was a Loon on Lake Megunticook with fishing line wrapped around its beak. Attempts to capture the bird that day had been unsuccessful, but we were asked to stand by for further attempts the following day. It was mid-afternoon when the call came in. The bird had been secured by a woman visiting from Arizona; she had waded into the lake, grabbed the weakened bird as it swam by; she held it in the water while a boy used her cell phone to call his mother, who in turn called the police. We immediately sent one of our volunteers, Kathy, to the scene. An hour had elapsed since the bird had been restrained, and the small crowd that had gathered was anxious. They cheered when Kathy got out of the car with heavy gloves and a large carrier. As soon as the bird arrived, we went to work and removed the line from its beak and tongue. But one end of the line went down the throat and did not respond to gentle tugging. We were able to get an x-ray that evening that confirmed what we feared: there was a hook in the throat.

The next morning, we conferred with veterinarians at Tufts Wildlife Clinic, who advised us on some strategies for removing the hook under general anesthesia. Marc was able to pull it out of the mouth, but Loons often have difficulty with anesthesia, and we almost lost the bird on the table; it took some mouth-to-mouth breathing and other emergency measures to revive the bird. But it was feisty enough to swim and eat a fish an hour later; staff member Paula took the bird back to Lake Megunticook and let it go, exactly 24 hours after its capture.

Swainson's Hawk

On September 28, 2002, a man from Lewiston was driving home from work when he saw a Hawk sitting in the road. He drove cautiously by the bird, but it did not fly off; so he backed up, got out and walked over to it. The bird tried to fly as he approached, but could only manage a few feet, and when Gary approached it a second time, the bird did not move. He picked it up, and drove home while holding it in one hand. As soon as he got home, he called a Warden, who took it to the Animal Emergency Clinic. There, a veterinarian examined the bird, which was too weak to even stand by then. It perked up a bit after she administered some fluids; the vet then called a Lewiston-area rehabilitator, who picked it up that evening and called us. The bird was very thin; she gave it more fluids and arranged to meet Marc in Augusta the next morning. Our rehabilitator friend Sherri was puzzled about what kind of Hawk she had; she couldn't identify it, and over the phone, Marc couldn't either.

When Marc opened the box and saw the bird, he did several double-takes. Was it a Rough-Legged Hawk? No, the legs were unfeathered. Was it a first-year Red-Tailed Hawk? No, the pattern on the tail wasn't right. He lifted the bird out of the box and, as all the Eastern Hawks came to mind, he eliminated them, one by one. The bird had very long wings with three notched primaries. Unlikely as it seemed at the time, Marc believed he was holding a Swainson's Hawk, a Western Hawk. Regardless of what type of Hawk it was, however, the bird was hungry. We started with some simple liquid foods, and at the end of the day, offered strips of mouse carcasses, which were eaten ravenously. Over the next few days, we alternated liquid foods with increasing proportions of solid foods. As soon as the bird was stable, we invited two Maine ornithologists knowledgeable about western birds over for a positive ID. They both confirmed that it was a Swainson's Hawk (the last confirmed record of a Swainson's Hawk in Maine was in 1977).

But this bird still weighed only 600 grams; the normal weight range for this species is about 700-950, with an average of about 800. Over the next couple weeks, though, he or she gained weight rapidly, and was nearly 900 grams by mid-October, when well enough to go outside, to our large flight cage. Now the problem was where to release the bird. That issue was related to another question: What was it doing here, anyway? Hurricane Isadore had come through New England just a couple days before it was rescued in Lewiston; had the storm somehow blown it off course during migration? But where would it have been migrating from or to? We turned to the species monograph in the Birds of North America series and contacted one of the authors, a university professor in Idaho. He and other authorities noted that a small group of Swainson's Hawks overwinters in Southern Florida and the Florida Keys. Although the breeding grounds of this group is unknown, one Raptor expert had speculated about Ontario. The professor's advice was to get the bird to Florida, and other specialists we consulted concurred.

But then we ran into an unexpected snag: the Florida rehabilitators whom we contacted did not believe there were Swainson's Hawks in their state! Diane was quite frustrated when she contacted the Florida Ornithological Society in early November. Its records secretary referred us to the Florida Keys Raptor Migration Project for HawkWatch International. Diane's e-mail was returned with an enthusiastic phone call; there definitely were Swainson's Hawks wintering in Southern Florida. It was recommended that we make arrangements to transfer the bird to the Bird of Prey Center of the Miami Museum of Science (MMS). Once the winter population stabilized and a reliable group had been located, the bird could be released. We followed through with the suggestion, and MMS agreed to take the bird.

Now the problem was getting the Hawk to Florida. It was already too cold for the bird to fly as cargo on a commercial flight out of northern New England (FAA regulations require the temperature to be at least 45 degrees for birds). Once again, though, our colleages at Tri-State Bird Research & Rescue helped out. A private corporate sponsor flew the bird to Delaware on November 26; after a three-week layover, the bird hopped a flight to Miami. We talked to the MMS folks on January 2; the bird was doing fine. Blood and feather samples had been taken; they would be used in DNA and mineral analysis that might help determine the origin of the bird. The bird was ready to go anytime. On January 18, the bird was released in a huge agricultural field near the main entrance to Everglades National Park.

Osprey

On July 15, 2002, we got a call from some folks who had kept a wounded Osprey in their custody for several days. Because they were so thrilled to have an Osprey in their home, they had not been in a hurry to notify authorities and turn it over to a licensed rehabilitator. Unfortunately, the bird had a badly fractured wing; there was blood all over the body, which the finders had, evidently, failed to notice, and the exposed bone ends had become necrotic. Marc took the bird to our veterinarian, who agreed that the wing could not be saved at this point. Sadly, this bird had to be euthanized. The prognosis would have been better if the finders had valued the welfare of the bird more than their own enjoyment.

Older Chickadee nestlings

The call came in near dusk on May 31 of 2001; earlier that day, the caller's husband had cut down a tree, and didn't notice the nest of Black-capped Chickadee hatchlings until it was on the ground. They had relocated the nest, but now it was several hours later on a chilly, windy afternoon, and the parents had not been seen. To make matters worse, the couple lived over fifty miles away, far from even secondary roads in an area we'd never traveled -- but they weren't willing to be inconvenienced by driving the birds even part way. It had been a long and exhausting day, and we had birds in need of care here that evening. In desperation, we telephoned Don and Carlene, the colleagues who had referred the call originally; despite their own busy schedule, they immediately offered to go fetch the Chickadees. But when the finder was contacted, she said that the babies were dead. Don and Carlene had another bird for us, so we met them in our usual place; when we got home, a message from them was on our machine: the "dead" Chickadees had revived in the woman's hands and they were leaving to get them. We finished tending to our patients, packed up some nestling formula, and drove to Don and Carlene's, where we fell asleep in their driveway waiting for them to return: "You never would have found it," said Don, grinning even at that hour. Carlene had kept the hatchlings snug and warm; Diane fed them immediately, and by midnight we had five squirmy babies tanked up and tucked in to an ICU. One of them had a broken leg, but we were able to splint it properly and it healed quite well. All five were released a month later.

Snowy Owl

This Snowy Owl's story illustrates rehab as a national and international endeavor. A Connecticut rehabber named Karen had admitted this bird far from his home in the Arctic Circle in November of 2000. Despite being thin, the bird had no appetite, and lost weight even after his parasites were treated. Bloodwork in December indicated the presence of Aspergillis, a fungus that is absent up North but common in New England. In poor food winters, snowys who come south often succumb to Aspergillosis -- respiratory overgrowths of fungus to which they have no natural resistance. It took Karen two months of hard work to treat it successfully, but when the drugs were at last discontinued in February 2001, the bird began to gain weight. At first Karen had hoped to have him flown up into northern Canada for release, but it would have taken too long to secure the permits necessary to take him across the border. When she explained her dilemma to the northeast district federal permit agent, he suggested that she contact us. Karen drove the bird here on April 28. He was in good feather and could readily fly the length of our largest cage. Because snowys had been observed in the Machias area at this time of year en route north, a decision was made not to hold him any longer than necessary. A week later, Marc and Terry drove the bird as close as they could get to the border, pointed the cage north, opened the door, and sent him on his way home.

Hairy Woodpecker

Late in May of 2001, we took in four Hairy Woodpecker nestlings who had been orphaned when a woodcutter missed seeing their nest-cavity in his routine check before he took down their tree. The birds were rescued immediately and delivered to us promptly. They were in good shape and their stay with us would have been unremarkable... except that about a week later, when they were just starting to peck insects out of a log, our intern Heather noticed the tongue of one of the males sticking out sideways at a right angle to the beak. It could not be retracted, and, since Woodpeckers rely on their tongues to get food into their mouths, it looked as if this bird might be doomed. But Marc wondered if the tongue could be treated with something along the lines of a bone pin for a fracture. He checked the idea out with a veterinarian at Tufts, who said, "Well, I've never heard of this being done, but it's worth trying, and here's how I think you should proceed..." With the bird under anesthesia, Marc carefully threaded a tiny hypodermic needle through the "fracture" site, securing the tongue into proper alignment. The bird was able to retract his tongue and tolerate the pin; after a week of very careful hand-feeding, Marc removed the pin, and we all were ecstatic when the tongue stayed in position over the next few days and the bird showed us that he was able to do all the things with his beak that a Woodpecker should do. The whole family was released on WMTW's TV cameras on June 19.

Chimney Swift

On a busy Monday morning early in August of 2001, we got a call about a nest of four Chimney Swifts that had been dropped off at a veterinary clinic on the previous Saturday. No one had known how or what to feed them, so they'd not eaten in two days. They were quite a distance from Avian Haven, and no one at the clinic was willing to drive them even part way. It took a number of phone calls, but a relay system involving several drivers was soon set up, and the birds arrived here several hours later. The baby Swifts were thin, cold and unresponsive. The littlest one was barely breathing and died a few hours later, despite all our efforts to save it. But Diane stayed up all night with the others, and by morning they had revived. These three were among the 36 orphans we raised that season; the last of them is shown here leaving Diane's hand on August 25 to join friends circling overhead.

Barred Owl younger nestling

Barred Owl adult and older nestling

Our first bird of 1999 was a Barred Owl hit by a car just a few miles from Avian Haven on a cold January night. Her left "wrist" was badly damaged; the avian equivalent of a thumb had been torn off and there was a compound fracture of one of the "hand" bones. Her rescuer, Frank, became a good friend over the many months we worked with the bird he named Emma. She regained quite a bit of power in her flight, but we felt she did not have enough maneuverability to catch live rodents. We were happy to invest in a long convalescence, however, and our federal permit officer granted us several extensions of the normal time limits for birds in rehab. Then in March of that year, another long-term semi-crippled Barred Owl came our way, from a retired rehabilitator. This bird and Emma got along just fine together, so when our colleague Jo called us one June night about an orphaned Barred Owl chick, we wondered if they would adopt. And they did -- not only Jo's chick but a second one that another colleague Sherri admitted a couple weeks later. One of these photos shows Jo's baby; the other shows Sherri's snuggled up to Emma. Owls are very prone to imprinting; if raised by humans, they tend to grow up not knowing they're Owls. So foster parents are ideal, not only because it saves rehabbers the work of feeding the chicks, but, even more importantly, because the chicks socialize properly. Frank and a friend let the two babies go on the evening of September 2.

Bald Eagle

On June 2, 2001, a New York game warden in Maine on vacation rescued a Bald Eagle that couldn't seem to get out of a river. Too weak to stand, the bird was admitted by our colleague Don, who transferred the bird to us the next day. By the time she arrived, she was starting to have seizures; we got a Tufts veterinarian on the phone, and followed his recommendations for treatment. But a half-hour later, the convulsions were so severe that the bird was almost somersaulting backwards. We administered the homeopathic remedy indicated for the posture the bird presented; within 15 minutes she was standing, and within an hour was walking. Fluids and liquid foods were tubed throughout that day and night; by morning the bird was positively feisty. Fecal analysis indicated the presence of liver flukes, which we treated. The bird improved rapidly after that; by the 23rd she was scarfing down fish, and a couple days later, we moved her out to the big cage to see how well she could fly. She flew just fine, and on June 29, Maine's Eagle biologist came down from Bangor to band the bird. She was released the next day.

Rufous Hummingbird

Around Thanksgiving of 2001, a woman named Liz was startled to see a Hummingbird feeding at an Impatiens on her deck in Old Orchard Beach. After a hard frost killed all the flowers in the area, she put her feeder back out, as the bird was seen flying around the deck as though looking for food. The bird was still there by the first of December, so she e-mailed the hot-line of the International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council. The two Hummer experts who responded both knew Diane; they suggested that Liz call Avian Haven if the bird didn't leave soon. But two weeks later it was still there, and the overnight temperatures had been below freezing. Liz had been getting up early to put out fresh sugar water each morning, but she knew this was not a complete diet and wondered how the bird would find insects in December, much less survive a Maine winter. On December 19 she decided she'd waited long enough and contacted us. Marc explained to her how to capture a Hummer; two days later she was successful and within 20 minutes of her call, we were all on the road headed for a rendezvous in Augusta. When Marc transferred the Hummer from her cage to our carrier, he confirmed what Liz had suspected, but what we could hardly believe even with our own eyes: it was a Rufous Hummingbird!

Ruby-Throated Hummers are common throughout the eastern United States. Rufies summer in the western states, although, in recent years, some have been known to overwinter along the gulf coast, and they've been spotted occasionally along the eastern seaboard, even as far north as Maine. Some speculate that the "vagrants" that far from home may be juveniles who got lost on their first attempted migration; others wonder if, for some unknown reason, these birds are deliberately establishing a new wintering ground. This Rufie seems to be only the 4th or 5th one confirmed in our state. We didn't have an indoor cage we thought would do for a lengthy stay, so Diane spent Christmas Day packing up all the books and various odds-and-ends in her study. After draping all the furniture with sheets, we filled the room with plants, set up feeders with complete Hummer formulas, and released the bird Liz named "Angel" into her winter quarters. The next spring, a Connecticut Hummingbird-bander drove to Maine to give her a bracelet; on May 7, 2002, we opened the window and after a few minutes of hesitation, she left with such quick flight that we were unable to follow the direction in which she'd traveled.

Common Raven

On the icy morning of February 8, 2000, a woman named Sylvia saw a Common Raven on his back, on the snow not far from her home in Fairfield Center. She assumed that he was dead and drove on by, but, on her return trip, decided to get out and check; to her surprise, he was alive, though barely. She bundled him up, took him home, and called us. When we examined him, we found puncture wounds on his head and thigh, perhaps the result of a predator attack. The wounds healed quickly, but about a week later one of his feet began, mysteriously, to swell; a few days later, the front claws began to slough. Over the course of the next month, we consulted with five different veterinarians, from Maine to Alaska, as the swelling continued despite all our efforts to control it and the tips of the front toes died. There were no fractures in the foot bones, nor was there any sign of infection; the final consensus was that we were looking at complications of frostbite. Still, we did not give up, and continued with allopathic, homeopathic and herbal remedies (including twice-daily foot soaks) through the end of March. Sylvia and her husband Daryl called us weekly for updates, and prayed daily for the bird's recovery. On the 31st of that month, their prayers were answered: our measurement of the foot revealed a sudden substantial deflation.

The Raven's foot improved rapidly after that: it could bear weight, and he was able to land successfully after flying. But would the foot injury compromise his chances of success in the wild? In mid-April, the Raven was examined by a wildlife veterinarian from Tufts who was in Maine to give teach in a Raptor workshop. He rendered the verdict we had hoped for: "I think the bird can make it -- let's give him the chance!" After two weeks of exercise in our large flight cage, we arranged to meet Sylvia and Daryl at the spot near their home where Sylvia had found him, three months almost to the day earlier. There wasn't a dry eye among us as, with an eager call, the Raven flew right off into the pine forest we assumed was home. We saw him go easily from tree to tree, deeper and deeper into the woods until we lost sight of him. Three weeks later, Daryl saw him alive and apparently well!

Peregrine Falcon

The story of the bird that was 2001's shortest-staying guest (as well as its rarest species) takes a long time to tell, because so many different people participated in an action-packed twenty hours. On the morning of July 6, a man named Jeff heard word on his day off from the Greenville Steam Company that a large Raptor of some kind was trapped in the plant. A bird-lover with a special fondness for Falcons, Jeff decided he had to try to get the bird out -- no easy task, since she was on a beam about 30 feet above him, in an enormous dark room with a temperature between 120 and 130 degrees. It took Jeff about two hours to catch the bird; by the time it was over, both of them were covered with dust, exhausted and badly overheated. He took the Raptor outside, set her in the shade, sprayed her gently with water and gave her water to drink. But, although the bird drank and drank, she did not fly away, and Jeff got worried. He noticed that the bird was banded; while he kept watch, secretary Debbie and her boss, Scott, got on the Internet to see if they could learn anything about the bird from the band numbers. To their astonishment, they discovered that the bird under the tree was a Peregrine Falcon. By this time, an hour had passed since Jeff brought the bird outside and she still hadn't gotten up -- so the three of them decided to call for help. They contacted Maine Audubon, and someone there referred them to Center for Wildlife in Cape Neddick. Realizing that we were much closer to Greenville, CFW called us. Arrangements were quickly made for Jeff and the Falcon to meet Marc in Newport (about halfway between Greenville and Freedom).

Marc had come prepared with electrolyte-containing fluids, which he stopped to administer every 20 minutes on the return trip. A thorough exam as soon as they got back revealed no fractures or obvious injuries; as the day wore on, we continued hydration and, by evening, she had eaten. Meanwhile, Marc had called a state Raptor biologist to let him know we had a species endangered in Maine. Charlie knew that there was a nesting pair of Peregrines on Kineo Island of Moosehead Lake; given the proximity to Greenville, it was assumed that this bird was the resident female.

Charlie arrived about noon the next day. A test flight in our large cage went just fine, and we all agreed that Charlie should drive her home that afternoon. To save some time on the last leg of the trip up the lake, he called ahead to arrange for a float plane to meet them in Greenville. As soon as the plane had landed at the base of the cliff of Kineo, Charlie let the Falcon go. She flew strongly, circling higher and higher; he was able to watch her for about ten minutes before she disappeared into the clouds.

This bird had been banded in Hartford, Connecticut in June, 1997. Though we believed she had subsequently moved to Maine and called Kineo home, a year later she was seen in New Hampshire.

Least Tern hatching egg

Least Tern nestling

Least Tern fledgling

One of our biggest thrills of the 2001 season was a new species for both of us: Least Terns, which are endangered in Maine. Our Tern story starts with a Unity College student named Gregg who worked with Maine Audubon as night caretaker of Maine's only colony at Laudholm Beach. It had been a hard season there -- on two previous occasions, nests had been washed out by storms and high water. When it happened again on the night of July 29-30, on impulse, Gregg waded through the water and picked up a newly-hatched chick plus a dozen eggs that would otherwise have washed out to sea. He was at our door at 7 the next morning with the eggs wrapped in tissue and the chick under his shirt for warmth. We decided to put the eggs in the hands of someone more experienced with hatching and made a call for help to our rehabber colleague Don. As soon as his commercial-size incubator had warmed up, we took ten undamaged eggs over. We kept the chick and two cracked eggs that were hatching prematurely.

Over the course of the next few days, the seven eggs that were fertile hatched at Don's. The last of these and the "premies" from the cracked eggs lived only a day or two despite round-the-clock care, but the original chick and six others grew up fine and healthy. After they graduated from the ICU, we set up a habitat for them in our indoor flight that was as much like home as possible: Gregg and staff member Lorie brought us sand, shells, driftwood, grasses, and even sand fleas from Laudholm Beach; our friend Rose, at National Audubon, arranged for Cornell University to loan us a recording of Least Tern colony sounds, which we played everyday in stereo. Marc consulted Tufts veterinarians and other Tern experts all over the country to make sure that we were optimizing all the pertinent factors. And of course we kept in touch with the state biologists who oversee endangered species.

By the end of August, our Terns were starting to fly; unfortunately, however, the colony at Laudholm had already migrated. Rose provided the key to getting our charges south: Sea World in Orlando would take them for flight conditioning and release into a nearby colony. Permission was secured from Maine and Florida Fish & Wildlife divisions for the birds to leave and arrive, respectively. Our federal permit officer expedited all the paperwork necessary for inter-state transfer to another national district. On September 1, a corporate sponsor flew the Terns by private jet to Delaware, where Tri-State Bird Rescue & Research provided a lay-over. Several days later, they were on their way by commercial jet to Orlando. Unfortunately, the local colony departed before they could be released, so a decision was made to overwinter the Terns and release them as soon as the wild group returned to Florida in the spring.

Sooty Tern

One of our most unusual patients of 1999 was a flat-lander Florida-coastal bird called a Sooty Tern that was apparently blown all the way up the East Coast by Hurricane Floyd! This juvenile tern was rescued from Floyd by a warden who found him by a roadside in the Manchester, Maine area. The warden brought him to our colleagues Don and Carlene, who, in turn, after correctly identifying the mysterious stranger from a field guide, called us. It was still raining hard that Friday night, Sept. 17, when Marc met Carlene to retrieve the bird from her. Thin, chilled and exhausted, the poor little guy was too weak to even hold his head up, much less stand; Marc gave him some warm fluids and put him into an incubator for the rest of the night. For the next couple days, he was fed liquids only: blenderized fish and fluids. As soon as he could stand up, we began to offer his natural diet of live fish (calls to some of our Southern counterparts confirmed our Northern hospitality meal plan). It was a week before the Sooty could walk without using his wings as crutches, but over the next couple weeks, he rapidly gained strength and recovered weight -- thanks to the good folks at a nearby bait shop, who kept us supplied with fish after their season would normally have closed. When the Tern started to fly laps around our indoor flight cage, we knew it was time for him to start his journey home, and Marc was happy to have him as a driving companion for an upcoming trip to a veterinary conference in Atlantic City. On October 8, Marc, the Tern, and a supply of live fish for the journey left Maine. Marc's passengers checked into Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research in Delaware the following day. After some R&R at Tri-State, the Tern was transferred to Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary in Florida; and at last, after some final flight conditioning there, the Sooty was released in home territory on November 17.