and here is the straight poop on the young male peregrine.

the young male peregrine was examined and x-rayed by the
zoo veterinarians at WPZ. it turns out that he had crashed
into a building last night sometime before 6pm, since he
was observed to be sitting on the ground shortly after 6pm
in rainier plaza. the security guards there watched him all
night with growing concern because he was still sitting on
the ground, motionless. the security guards called the
hotline several times during the night to report this, but no
one was answering. finally, the male peregrine was brought in
to WPZ this morning at 645am and placed into an observation
cage until 2 this afternoon.

at this point, the zoo veterinarians removed him from the cage,
noticing that his beaks did not meet properly and that he had
bruising on his upper eyelids (possible concussion). the tech
anesthetized the screaming bird before they examined him. the
veterinarians took six x-rays (two were whole-body x-rays and
four were head x-rays), drew blood for some lab work, and
injected him with corticosterone (to promote tissue regeneration).
the bird was then placed back into the observation cage after he
had awakened from the anesthetic, the veterinarians studied the
x-rays and discovered that the young peregrine has a fractured
bone in his lower left mandible and decided that it will take
at least two weeks to heal ("if everything goes perfectly" as one
vet said). they are planning on keeping the bird at the zoo while
he recovers since he cannot feed himself at this point in time.

when i left the office, the young raptor had finished a meal
of bite-sized chunks of quail and was looking quite well, even
though his lower mandible seemed to bother him a little bit.

during the examination, i noticed that the peregrine did not
appear to be thin at all, inspite of what i was told originally.
in fact, he was nicely muscled and his keel bone did not
protrude above the surrounding muscle tissue at all. his plumage
was in perfect condition, there were no stress marks and no
missing feathers.


it turns out that the young hen had taken her maiden flight
saturday and she the disappeared for 24 hours after being
spooked off the roof of a nearby building. she was rediscovered
yesterday, sitting on the roof of the brick building that is
next to the washington mutual building (geez, the name escapes
me at the moment!), where her nest is located. she is doing
quite well.

deborah
nyneve at u.washington.edu