Tag: brown pelican

“Just a thought” in my mind becomes a new dream

“Just a thought” in my mind becomes a new dream

Terri
Great blue heron seen recently on a jetty along Naples Beach. Just looked so majestic, standing there for the longest time

So here is something I have thought about doing over the years. If I ever get my big girl pants on and decide to travel in an RV or some other form around the US, I would like to see a bunch of national parks. BUT what I ALSO want to do is visit a ton of animal sanctuaries, especially wildlife sanctuaries/rehab facilities. I really enjoyed the time i spent with the Peace River Wildlife Center, and one of the things that i have really liked about living in Florida is the wildlife. It is freaking amazing!!

One of my favorite things to do here at the beach is to watch the pelicans dive bomb for their food from the sky, or fly so low and close to the water that I’m amazed that they don’t get their wings wet while doing it. If you have ever seen a pelican dive, or even if you haven’t, then you will want to check out this video on YouTube: Pelicans Dive Bombing Once they enter the water, they open up their throat pouch, which can hold as much as three GALLONS of water, and catch fish, which they then turn around in their pouch, if need be, to swallow the fish whole, face first.

I watch the sandpipers run up and down the sand, in and out of the path of the waves. I watch the willets near the shoreline. If I’m lucky, I get to see a great egret or snowy egret stalk some prey (ahem, fish). And on the really awesome days, i get to see dolphins. Of all the days I have spent mornings or sunsets at the beach, I have only been lucky to see some jumping out of the water. (I used to think they were playing but have since found out that they do that to be able to see the fish better, or to cover more “ground” than just by swimming.)

Brown Pelicans on pilings

The pelicans closest to me (the camera) are juveniles, which you can tell by their coloring on their heads and necks (gray). Toward the middle of the photo and at the back, you will see two with white necks. Those are adults. They don’t get their adult coloring until they reach the age of three.

Anyway, I digress. Anyone who has worked in animal welfare knows it doesn’t pay well. It is a true “labor of love.” One of the last things those folks do have is time to market themselves or publicize their work. Many depend on volunteer labor to get everything done. What I would like to do is travel to these sanctuaries, volunteer if possible, talk to the folks who work there or run them, and then write about them or get their good deeds known to others. Still brainstorming the best ways to do that. TRANSLATION: Anyone have any good ideas about that? (Instagram, YouTube, podcast?) Please comment below!

Hand in hand with this idea is another one that occurred to me while on a recent run. There don’t seem to be a searchable database of these types of organizations/wildlife sanctuaries. I can find some for animal shelters but not wildlife rehabilitation centers or sanctuaries.

The librarian in me will never die — I would love to create something like that for others like me who care about the animals of the world and how we can protect them, donate to help them, or volunteer our labor as well. While I do think I am adept at learning new things, a software engineer or database creator I am not. However I am sure there is someone out there who could help or at least point me in the right direction to get this idea cracking. So if you are reading this blog and know of someone who can assist, even in some small way, with info, ideas etc., PLEASE share this post with them! I know I can create a web page that organizes that info in possibly a table format, etc., but there has to be a better way!

Information I’d like to include about the sanctuaries/rehab facilities would be:

  • Name of sanctuary
  • Location
  • Populations/Species of animals cared for
  • Information on donating to the sanctuary (via links, posssibly)
  • Information on volunteering at the sanctuary (via links, possibly)
  • Information on the mission or vision statement of that sanctuary
  • Thoughts on the sanctuaries that I do visit as well as links to my writeup/podcast/video, etc., on that sanctuary

Any other ideas any of you might have out there? I know I am not the only person in the world who loves and appreciates wildlife and wants to do whatever they can to help them in these times of climate change and shrinking habitats. I would like to use my talents and skills to do my part. And, I feel like this suits my me more than pursuing a marine biology degree because science and math are truly not my strong suits. I felt like for those few months of school just recently, I was pounding my head against a wall, trying to do something which I am just not naturally suited for. Writing, educating, organizing and speaking are where I excel much more.

Photo of recent sunset along Naples Beach, just because.

What do you think? A worthwhile idea, or am I just crazy??

Clearly, it would take time to develop but over time, little things add up. My thinking is that this adventure of traveling to the sanctuaries could start late 2021.

All About Animals: Birds Edition

All About Animals: Birds Edition

Terri

I mentioned in a recent post that one of my happy places is the Peace River Wildlife Center where I volunteer on the weekend as a tour guide. I love that I get to be around beautiful animals but cannot be tempted to bring them home with me because well, it’s illegal to have wildlife in your home as a pet. And if you’ve taken a look at The Herd page, well, you know I really don’t have room for more!! Nor can I afford to take care of any more!

PRWC is a small wildlife rehab center and sanctuary that does amazing work for the budget that it has.  It is run on private donations and most of the folks that greet visitors are volunteers such as myself but there are some paid staff such as the wildlife rehabilitator and techs and an office manager/volunteer coordinator/she of many hats! I find that as I am learning more about the animals and the organization, my time at PRWC is becoming more and more important to me each week. I truly look forward to the hours I spend there, and have now joined their outreach team. (The photos below that were taken with humans around were from an outreach event about a week ago.)

If you’d like to help PRWC’s cause (or any one of a number non-profits like them), then when you shop on Amazon, go instead to Amazon Smile and pick the charitable organization of your choice. At no extra cost to you, that charity will get a small percentage of the cost of your items donated to them. It may only be pennies at a time but over time, believe me, it can add up.

Down here in Florida, I am fortunate to see a lot of wildlife so I am sharing some in this post that I have seen since I’ve moved here along with some photos of ambassador animals from PRWC. The ambassadors go to outreach events to let people know about the center and serve as great sources of education and inspiration for anyone who is able to see them up close.

By the way, these brown pelicans shown below were waiting for a fisherman who was cleaning off some fish, to throw them scraps. PSA: fisherman should not throw them parts of fish. If there are any bones sticking out, it can really do a number on ripping up their throat when they eat it. It’s best for a pelican to eat a fish whole.

Two adult brown pelicans as seen in Naples last year. You know they are adults because their necks are white. They don’t get their adult colors until they turn three. The one appearing closest to me as the photographer appears to have a chestnut colored neck. That means he or she was in mating/nesting mode. They don’t get this dark chestnut color until they turn at least three. After nesting season is over, that color will molt off and they will return to their full white necks. We have many of these pelicans at PRWC!
Black crowned night heron – this one was seen at the Seaside Bird Sanctuary, Indian Shores, Florida. This one was not a resident of the sanctuary but seemed unfazed by all the humans walking right by him/her.
Okay, it’s not a bird but a gopher tortoise. We have one named Legoless (a few amputations on her foot due to being attacked by a dog) at our sanctuary.
Saw these flamingos at Sunken Gardens in St. Petersburg, Florida. I’ve been told that, similar to the roseate spoonbill, they have pink feathers due to their diet. My sanctuary does have a roseatte spoonbill named Spork. He was almost dead from starvation when found, as he couldn’t fly. He has had a wing amputation and is one of my favorites at PRWC.
Cruiser is an American Kestrel. Smallest type of falcon in North America. One of the types of birds where the male is more brightly colored than the female (his wings have some blue to them.) Named Cruiser because he was hit by a car and found by a biker who picked him up, put him in his saddlebags and brought him to PRWC. That was about two years ago. He is estimated to be about three years old.
Here is a close up of Cruiser’s beautiful face!
Luna is a very rare Eastern Screech Owl if not the only one that is totally white! Eastern screech owls are the smallest owl to be found in Florida. Usually they blend into the background of a tree where they may be hanging out. Luna does not have the pigment needed to help him protect himself in the wild. Eastern screech owls usually live about three years in the wild. Luna turns 7 on April Fools Day! (No joke!)
Isn’t Orion majestic?? He is a three year old barred owl that imprinted on humans at a very young age. The story about him is that as a baby, he tried to fly. Didn’t go so well and he found himself on the ground. A lady found him and called the Fish and Wildlife folks who put him back in the tree. But she had become enamored with him and would go out and talk to him and sometimes feed him. So he never learned to hunt for food on his own. So now he, along with Luna and Cruiser are just a few of the ambassador animals found at PRWC.
Here is another photo of Orion. Owls have many more vertebrae in their neck than humans, which is what allows them to turn 270 degrees!! I believe at the time I took this photo, he might have been giving a dog the stink-eye!

So that’s it for this post. I plan on adding more information to the Animal Rights and Welfare Groups page and have some thoughts about adding an Educational Resources/Tools page to this blog. (You really can take the girl out of the library but not the library out of the girl.) Let me know what you think about that, and I hope that you enjoy these photos and the little bits of information I was able to share!