News Stories

SPARROWHAWK ON IT'S WAY TO RECOVERY FOLLOWING COLLISION WITH LORRY!

January 2011

A juvenile male sparrowhawk was rushed into Four Paws vets in Warrington by the driver of an Eddie Stobbart lorry who accidentally collided with him as he was zipping across the road!
Although in a bad way he had miraculously survived the impact.


The bird was examined and although no fractures were noted he had obviously taken a blow to the head and was extremely dazed. (Fig 1.) The bird was stabilised with fluids and anti-inflammatories over night by the staff at Four Paws before being transported to AVS for further evaluation. On examination he was very quiet with a swollen right eye and was blind on that side. Using an opthalmoscope we were able to see that he had a bleed at the back of the eye with a partially detached retina. (Fig 2 shows a normal bird retina, with the black pecten consisting of delicate blood vessels. Image courtesy of Dr. Ruediger Korbel.)


Such bleeds can potentially resolve over time but any eye injury is never good news for an aerial predator who relies on binocular vision to home in on a moving target. With supportive care he began to show signs of improvement. Over the next few days he brightened up, and started eating on his own (which is a feat in itself when dealing with these particularly highly strung individuals!). The swelling had subsided and to all intents and purposes he appeared normal. Ophthalmologic examination however revealed he still had damage to his retina and although he was now visual on that side, his peripheral vision was obviously impaired.


The big question now was given the above, would he still be able to hunt successfully. If not, by releasing him back to the wild, we would be condemning him to death by starvation. The only way to know for sure would be to actually witness him catching prey and the only way to do this would be to train him using falconry techniques and assess him in his natural environment. This process does not by any means result in a tame or humanised bird as away from the primary trainer, and out of a fixed routine after a few days they are as wild as the day they came into captivity.


Having flown captive bred sparrowhawks for falconry Richard is experienced in dealing with these sometimes tricky individuals and so took on the task. The bird was temporarily kitted out in falconry equipment consisting of light leather straps or 'jesses' to obtain a degree of control (a bit like a lead on a dog), a plastic tail guard to protect his fragile tail feathers and a properly fitted hood (Fig 3.)


Being a wild bird he was obviously scared of humans so a hood is used initially to keep him calm, and he was initially offered food 'in the hood' by gently stroking his beak and feet. (Fig 4.) Every time he took a morsel of meat a whistle was blown so he started to associate the whistle with the act of feeding which for a bird of prey is what life is all about. Soon enough on hearing the whistle he would immediately look down for food.


Eventually Richard and the whistle became synonymous with food and so it wasn't long before he had him jumping and then flying to the glove for food rewards. (Fig. 5, 6 and 7) He could also avoid obstacles in his flight path and was obviously having no problem seeing and hitting the food on the glove but fleeing prey would be a whole different ball game. We are currently waiting for a tiny radio transmitter to arrive which when attached to him via a specially designed harness (Fig. 8) will enable us to monitor him closely when free flown and put into a hunting situation.


Time will tell but fingers crossed despite his injury he will prove his ability and be able to secure a meal for himself. As soon as he does we will wish him all the best and pack him off back to Warrington where hopefully he will have learned the green cross code!!