[ad_1]
Supplied
Purple, the rescued ruru, looks a bit scruffy after his antibacterial bath.
A ruru will soon find its wings again after being treated to health at New Zealand’s best wildlife hospital.
Purple, the pigiest, is weeks away from being returned to the wild after being discovered ill and alone in the Wellington region over the Christmas period.
Veterinarians at the Wellington Zoo treated the three-week-old manu (bird) for injuries to his feet and brought him to Central Energy Trust Wildbase Recovery in Palmerston North for rehabilitation in January.
As Purple’s stay continued, the recovery center staff realized something was wrong.
READ MORE:
* Native hawk freed near Feilding after injuring his leg.
* Palmerston North Wildbase Recovery Center opens for public tours
* Penguin to be released after four months at Wildbase Hospital with a broken leg
Wildbase Hospital Recovery Technician and Supervisor Pauline Nijman noticed that Purple’s feathers were absorbing water, and since waterproofing was a threshold for release in the wild, she began to investigate.
“Their main feathers weren’t waterproof, so we kept asking ourselves, ‘What are we missing?’
Nijman discovered scaly skin under Purple’s chest feathers that had spread across his body caused by bacterial cocci.
Purple was unable to get rid of the bacteria as it damaged his feathers, but Nijman knew the remedy.
A 40-degree-centigrade bath in chlorhexidine, a wild-type chemical base used to clean oil from birds caught in spills, and Purple is getting better, Nijman said.
“It is a world apart from what it used to be. I hope now that we have it under control, you can go [into the wild]. “
Watching Purple fly through his aviary, Nijman was sure he would be back in the trees in the next few weeks.
“Rehab is a lot like people building muscles to do what they normally would, whether it’s climbing stairs or flying from tree to tree to crush berries.
“They need care to make sure they can fly and survive in the wild, they also need to show that they can hunt.
“There are a lot of predators and weather events. It’s a very tough place, it’s very unforgiving, they don’t deliver food to you. “
Supplied
Purple, the ruru is glad to be dry.
Wildbase had been in business for more than 20 years and saw about 120,000 people walk through the doors of the recovery center each year.
After a sponsor withdrew $ 40,000 of their funding, Wildbase Hospital was looking for a new donor to help them keep their care.
Center manager Chris Smith said that everyone who worked with the animals was doing their best to provide the highest quality care possible.
“You feel that there is an attachment to the work that you are doing for the animals.”
Smith said the public could also help with his manu recovery by keeping drones on the ground at Esplanade, where the rehab center is located.
“We are asking the people of Palmy to help us with this by keeping drones away from our recovering birds.
“Our patient and resident birds are sensitive to drones due to their type of noise and movement, as to them it can appear like a predator.”
