Juju, the toughest Crow in the world!
WARNING! This story is rather graphic...
My friend has a city forestry job and while doing her job comes across many animals that get knocked from the trees and need fostering.
We have taken care of a variety of baby birds and injured animals over the years and we have many friends that will just call me and my boyfriend and report an animal in need. We are an underground leigon of wildlife rehabilitators:D
So about a month ago she calls me and says "Hey you'll never guess what I have in my lap!" (i told her long ago if she ever finds a crow that would be really awesome.) "A Crow!"
She saw him hobbling around on the property she was working at, she saw his wing was broken and had to run him down. The crow was VERY alert and elusive and only when he got caught up in a bush was she able to grab him.
So she dropped him off with his wing bound to his body with cloth.
His wing was worse than we had thought.
Think of a human arm because a birds wing works about the same way.
pretend your fingers are primary flight feathers and the back of your arm to your elbow are secondary flights. So this poor crow had broken his bones just below the "wrist". Bones were poking through the skin and infection had started. The wound smelled of rotting meat and who knows how long this crow had the injury.
We have successfully amputated birds limbs before (I have a cockatiel without a foot and he gets around like a champ.)
We are NOT vets, we have no medical background but it was either do what we could for this bird or the infection would surely take his life.
So to make it short and less graphic we amputated behind his broken bones and cauterized the open skin. The bleeding was very minimal i think because the skin and meat were dying in that area already.
So after we got him all bandaged up we checked him for external parasites, which suprisingly he looked great. Usually crows are quite infested.
We treated him for mites and worms and gave him an oral antibiotic.
Its been almost a month and Juju is doing awesome. He gets around very well without a wing and explores the room he stays in. He is our little buddy.
We have an injured pigeon as well that could never be realeased, he follows us around the house so Juju will fit in with us just fine. :D
Thanks for reading Juju's story.
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Re: Juju, the toughest Crow in the world!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
mues155
We are NOT vets, we have no medical background but it was either do what we could for this bird or the infection would surely take his life.
So to make it short and less graphic we amputated behind his broken bones and cauterized the open skin. The bleeding was very minimal i think because the skin and meat were dying in that area already.
Not to seem rude or anything, but you amputated his wing YOURSELF and you have no medical background and are not a vet??? I'm glad he is doing better now, but you'll have to forgive me if I find this to be a little sketchy. :confused:
Re: Juju, the toughest Crow in the world!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
AK907
Not to seem rude or anything, but you amputated his wing YOURSELF and you have no medical background and are not a vet??? I'm glad he is doing better now, but you'll have to forgive me if I find this to be a little sketchy. :confused:
I'm not a vet, but when I realized one of my Anoles a long time ago had a broken jaw and became very weak, I put him down.
IMO, quality of life outweighed the bird being put down. I don't have a problem with what they did, especially to see that the bird is doing well.
Good on you guys for rescuing him.
Re: Juju, the toughest Crow in the world!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
AK907
Not to seem rude or anything, but you amputated his wing YOURSELF and you have no medical background and are not a vet??? I'm glad he is doing better now, but you'll have to forgive me if I find this to be a little sketchy. :confused:
Well there were a few options for this bird...
1. Crow lives on its own with a broken wing on the ground until caught by a cat, run over by a car, or the infection eventually takes hold of him. He dies.
2. We try and help him, we amputate the wing and with our experience in doing minor surgeries to help various animals we feel confident and go through with it. He dies
3. We try and help him, we amputate the wing and with our experience in doing minor surgeries to help various animals we feel confident and go through with it. He lives.
3. is the story the crow has gone through. We saved his life, he is in a spare aviary i used to use for cockatiels. Of course compaired to the open wild and being free his quality of life has gone down a bit. But an intelligent creature such as a crow will be able to explore, play and learn from being a captive pet. IMO its better than being dead, or suffering a death of a broken wing.
Its cool if some people would say oh its nature you should have just left him alone. Thats fine for most people but if i can help then i will. And it was a success. So I feel good about it.
