This is a blog about our experiences as relatively new wildlife carers. It's not a reference guide on how to look after animals, there's too much left unwritten in our posts for that and we don't always get it right.
Remember, wild animals belong in the wild, they don't belong to us!
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Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Bringing your work home

Donna's working part time as a receptionist at a vet surgery. The pay isn't the best, but that's balanced out by other things. Below are pics of some of the other things.





The bird is a young Noisy Miner. Now I've got to admit that noisy miners are one of my favourite birds, despite the reason they got their name. We have two options with this little critter. As they are territorial, they need to be in a group when they're growing up, this means either we pass him (or her) on to a carer that has other noisy miners, or we take on a few more to keep it company. The jury is out on that at the moment.

The ringtail possum had her tail run over by a car. Ringtails, with their prehensile tail, rely on the tail being healthy. We're keeping an eye on her to make sure the tail is okay, and if it is she'll most likely be released within a few days. As you can see from the pic though, she's a mum. That was another concern yesterday, but seeing the littlun tonight was a big plus. Mum seems to be over the shock of her injury and is moving around more, so things are looking good for the two of them.
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2 comments:

Unknown said...

Sorry to hear the little fellow didn't make it. It's a shame Noisy Miners are so damn territorial. They're marvellous, marvellous critters otherwise, with the most human expressions I've seen on bird faces with the way they can cringe or love or warn all with the movement of the black fluff & yellow skin around their eyes.

I take it you're in Brisbane or some such city outside of Victoria? Intending to move to Melbourne next year, but the law in Vic rules out having Noisy Miners, no matter the background and licensing you have already. Trying to find out how to appeal the law so I can take mine with me, since I can hardly leave them here or have them put down. I'm sure people look after the birds as is in Victoria and ignore the licensing, but there's the matter of being able to get qualified veterinary care without the birds being put down for being banned. :/

I'm agreed on people leaving Noisy Miners where they are when found - their families do marvellous jobs of looking after them, aside from when the elements are especially nasty (killed the nest I'd been watching outside overnight, which was sad).

Steve said...

I really can't understand why the Vic government have that stand on noisy miners. Ok they're in plague proportions at the moment, but the fact that they're natives should stand for something.

The inconsistency between the states, as far as wildlife caring is concerned is ridiculous. If any native animal comes into care in QLD and it's obvious that it isn't viable for it to be released in the future, then it's supposed to be euthenased. I think there are exceptions to that though.

Obviously that isn't the case in SA as you're keeping your guys legally.

I'm not sure, but I believe that in WA you don't even need a licence to be a carer. That's scary when you think that people are looking after wildlife with no help from a carer's network, and no training.

There needs to be some consistency nationwide, especially considering the fact that a lot of wildlife come into care because of humans.