Thank you to everyone for sharing the love and showing your support for our recent successful wildlife releases. We release wild animals back into their natural habitat on a regular basis but not every release is filmed and not every rehabilitation is photographed. The staff at the JSPCA just crack on with the work they need to do to ensure the animals are receiving the care that is required to get them back to full health. If we do end up filming/photographing the animals journey with us it is a bonus as we love the memories and the happy endings which we then get to share with you.
That being said we are so grateful that this special release was filmed.
A member of the public found a Barn Owl grounded behind a vehicle in a field near Maufant Village. They called us to report what they had found and we sent out our Ambulance Driver to attend.
On arrival to the JSPCA the Barn Owl was very cold and weak. He was placed into a quiet room with a heat pad to warm up before we did anything else. After approximately half an hour we assessed the Barn Owl thoroughly. His eyes/ears/beak/nares/mouth were all normal. No abnormalities were found on his wings or legs and his body condition was normal. He was dehydrated and very weak.
The Barn Owl did have an identification ring on his leg so we tracked down the details via our contact Dave Buxton who reported to us that this Barn Owl was ringed by Ian Buxton as a youngster in its nest in St Martin in 2018!
The veterinary surgeon administered an injection of pain relief to help with any swelling or trauma and injected warmed fluids under the skin to help with dehydration. He was tube fed via a crop tube with a special liquid carnivore care mix for his first feed to ensure he had sufficient nutrients from the start. A tail guard was placed on his tail feathers to ensure no damage occurred to them during his rehabilitation.
Later that afternoon he had brightened up and was administered another dose of carnivore care mix via a crop tube before our clinic team moved him up to our dedicated Raptor Unit. Here he was kept warm, dry, had minimal contact with humans and most importantly he had a safe area to himself to help with his rehabilitation. Overnight he was offered cut up pieces of mice to entice him to eat by himself.
Over the weekend the clinic team kept a close eye on him and cared for him. He was eating his mice well by himself and got stronger by the day. He had a check up with our veterinary surgeon after the weekend and he was given the go ahead to move up to one of our aviaries to get him back flying.
Yesterday the veterinary surgeon was happy for him to be released! The team were thrilled and he was released at dust last night by our contact Dave Buxton close to the area he was found.
Barn Owls are to be released at dusk as this is when they are most active and it will give our Barn Owl the best chance at survival as he can hunt straight away and get settled.
We cannot thank the finder of this Barn Owl enough. Your quick actions of calling us to come and collect the bird as soon as you knew he was in trouble really did save its life. If you come across injured wildlife please do not hesitate to contact us. The quicker you make contact and phone us the quicker we can help and it gives the animal the best chance of survival. Save our numbers in your phone in case this happens to you: main number 01534 724331 and our Out of Hours Emergency number 07797 720331.
This is why we are here, this is what we do and we cannot continue to do this without the support of the public. Please donate to help us continue to rehabilitate the wildlife of Jersey: https://www.justgiving.com/campaign/saveourshelter
To View The Release Video Please Click Here
