Masked plover

Scary noisy miners

I received a call from the rescue office to pick up an injured noisy miner with two babies that was located on the side of the road of the Cammeray Golf-course. The caller described to me a parent bird that was flapping its wings who was injured and was making a lot of noise to protect its babies when approached by him. He couldn?t get close enough to take the babies off the road who couldn?t get up over the ledge of the gutter. I thought to myself, fair enough. Noisy miners are very protective of their babies and will sound the alarm if you get too close to their babies.

On arriving at the scene I was confronted with indeed a noisy adult bird with two babies, but they weren?t noisy miners. They were scary masked plovers. On seeing the masked plovers where the noisy miners should have been I panicked. I remembered being attacked by a pair of plovers when I was little playing in the park, not realising they had built a nest and the memory came back to me.

Masked plovers are usually docile birds but are very protective when they have a nest or young around. They like to make their nests on any flat surface, whether it be on a sports oval, park or even a building roof. They dive bomb like magpies, but don?t actually peck you and pull out at the last minute whilst making a really loud ?ker ki ki ki? call.

I approached the family of plovers slowly at first, then when they sounded the alarm I got in quickly and grabbed the two babies. I then bolted a fair distance into the golf-course whilst dodging the aerial attacks of the adults. After placing the babies down on the ground I dashed back into the cover of the trees. The adults eventually calmed down and got back to their babies. The family was safe in the golf-course off the road.

Wow! That was an adrenaline rush, even bigger than the ones I get when confronting a snake.

Snake on the roof

This rescue started off with a call to pick up a snake that was up on top of the roof shed of the caller. I spoke to the caller who said that there was an injured snake atop the roof shed. It was obvious to me after a few minutes into speaking to the caller that he did not want the snake around. He had a child and did not want his son harmed. (Fair enough).

The caller identified the snake as a red-bellied black snake as it was black on top, but he couldn?t actually see its belly. He had made a lot of noise around the snake to try and get it to move away, but it went on dozing in the sun. I calmed the caller as much as I could and called back a couple of hours to see if it was still there. It was indeed. There was something suss about this snake who was not obviously trapped but would not budge, so I went over to the caller?s place to remove the snake.

When I identified the snake it was not a red-bellied black snake, or even the alive type. It was a plastic toy snake. The caller was very embarrassed and so was I. This wasn?t the first time that I had received a call from a distressed person about snakes on their roof which turned out to be toys. I had another a couple of months back (is it just me, or is this common?).

The culprit 'snake'

One-eyed mother ringtail, with two babies

The Ringtail possum family

On another rescue I was called out to pick up a baby ringtail that was found at the base of the callers tree in the front yard. The mother ringtail was up in the tree with another baby ringtail on its back during daytime. I got out to the site and found out that the mother had dropped the other baby. I was also told by the caller that a currawong had been seen lurking about. I checked the babies for injuries. One had a weepy eye, but other than that both were fine. So I went and placed the twins in a pouch together on top of some towels with a nice hot-water bottle.

I did a bit of background checking and was told by the caller that the mother had been seen on the previous day out and about during the day. This seemed a bit weird because possums are nocturnal and shouldn?t be out and about during the day. While I was observing the mother happily munching away on fruit on one of the lower branches of the tree I decided that I would try to grab her. I climbed up a little way up the tree and managed to get a good hold of her tail and scruff of neck. Once on ground I had a good look at her and noticed that one of her eyes was missing. It was lucky that she was low up in the tree and that I could get a hold of her.

Ringtail possums usually need the use of both eyes in order to survive well in the wild. Brushtail possums on the other hand can cope OK with the use of only one eye (read on for Percy, the one-eyed possum). The ringtail mother's missing eye may have been one reason why she was out and about during the day.

I took the family of three and passed them onto another foster carer who happened to have a spare aviary to house them all in. The mother would raise her own babies in the safety of the aviary.

Percy, the one-eyed (brushtail) possum

This rescue occurred a couple of years ago on the grounds of a TAFE college. I got a call to pick up an adult female brushtail possum who was found sleeping inside a rubbish bin. She had a badly injured left eye that was all filled with puss. Her sleeping arrangements probably wouldn't have made her eye get any better.

The callers informed me that there were many brushtail possums around in the grounds and warned me that the last WIRES person to pick one up off the grounds got bitten on the thumb. Adult brushtail possums can get pretty aggressive when in a vulnerable position and are approached. I always bring gardening gloves and many sets of towels when called out to pick up an adult brushtail.

This big girl was OK though and didn't put up much of a fight, so the transfer from bin to rescue cage went very smoothly (probably because I bundled her up in many layers of towels, as quick as I could). I went and took her to a vet clinic who generously treats and patches up wildlife at no charge. One of the vets who is very familiar with me because of all the wildlife that I brought in was great and actually operated on the possum's eye and cleaned it up very well. James the vet placed her under anaesthetic, took the eye out and stitched it up. The nurses at the clinic affectionately named the possum Percy. I was advised by James to keep Percy for a while until her eye had healed up a bit before releasing her.

So I kept Percy in my aviary and filled it with branches, leaves, an assortment of fruit, and some water. You would think that this sort of  accommodation and free food would keep a possum happy, but this was not so for Percy. During the third night after her surgery she found a weak spot in my aviary which she chewed through, and managed to squeeze her way out to freedom. It was amazing! The hole that she squeezed through was so small.

It is just as well that she is a female, because male brushtail possums usually have to fight to gain a place in new territory. Having an injury would not have helped in her situation, trying to fit into a new area, had she been a boy. She would have still found it difficult in a new area, but she has adapted well to my area because I still see her around from time to time. Just goes to show how determined our wildlife can be to adapt and survive.

Ringtail babies (good & naughty)

This is a story that started out sad, but ended becoming a happy ending. It started out with a call to pick up a baby ringtail possum who was found in the backyard of the caller beside the body of its mother. I got my gear ready and was over at the caller's place in a flash. The callers had a dog which was kept inside while I tended to the baby and examined the mother. It was very stange! The mother's body had no physical injuries. No bruising on her paws to indicate electrocution, no puncture wounds or fur missing to indicate an animal attack. There didn't seem to be any kinks in her spine either to suggest a broken back. It was a mystery to how and why she died.

I was told by the caller's that they had found the mother in the afternoon, but judging by the stiffness of her body I assumed that she had died overnight. I next attended to the baby. The poor baby girl had gone through the whole day standing vigil by her mum with no milk. I would re-hydrate her later.

My examination of the body didn't end there. There was a bulge in the mother's pouch with a little tail sticking out. She had twins and they were both girls. I later got a cotton pouch and rubbed it on the mother's fur to get her scent before taking the two bubs and placing them inside it. Then it was re-hydrating time.

Once the two little girls were warmed up I made up some special lactose-free milk out of powder and water. Baby possums (and many other animals) are lactose intolerant so we have to feed them this special milk. There are many brands that can be bought at pet shops or wildlife stockists.

I don't like naming the babies that come in because once they are named I get attached to them. Their cute adorable features such as bright eyes, miniatures paws, tiny pink nose, and long tails are very hard to resist as it is. These two girls became known as 'Good', because when she first came in she took to the milk straight away, and 'Naughty' (because she didn't like the milk). Later on when they both drank well I got them muddled up because they were twins and looked so much alike.

The girls grew up so quickly and before I knew it they were off milk and into leaves, fruit, and trying to get out of their cage and running around. They would get a brief chance to run and jump around while I cleaned their cage and replaced the food, but it would be near impossible to get them back in. After getting them back in they would cling to the side of the cage and stare out with those bright eyes. Once the girls were big enough I had to pass them onto somebody who had an unoccupied aviary. My aviary had some rainbow lorikeets in them that were not ready for release.

For about a week I kept the two girls in an unused shower with a big branch and the railing side of a cot so that they could run around. I must say that this was a very convenient setup because cleaning was made very easy because of the fact that it was a shower. Once another volunteer's aviary was free I passed the two now grown up possums on so that they could be outside and have more room to run around before release. Once ready, the door to the aviary would be opened at night so that the two girls would be able to come and go from the safety of the aviary as they pleased. This is called a soft release, and we try to do this with hand-reared animals as much as we can.