A single long - eared owl is still alive despite being infected with a terrible sickness. At the University of Minnesota's Raptor Center in St. Paul, the adult female has begun to feed, act, and sound normal.
She is the only known wild raptor in Minnesota that has recovered from a particularly nasty episode of avian flu, one of the worst in living memory.
"We're simply very, very thrilled that one owl was able to survive this infection," said Victoria Hall, executive director of the institute.
The bird's recovery is an uncommon indication of optimism for what is occurring in the wild, since the strain of influenza has almost always been lethal to owls, eagles, hawks, and other raptors. The bird flu pandemic, which began in Europe, is unparalleled in terms of scale, scope, and devastation done to wild birds as it expands in the United States. Humans are not at risk from the infection.
The last major avian flu epidemic in Minnesota, in 2015, decimated poultry farms and backyard hens but did not result in huge die-offs in the wild. This spring, chicken farms have suffered massive losses once again, but widespread fatalities of wild birds are a new phenomena.
The Raptor Center alone has determined that the virus has killed 16 owls, 13 bald eagles, and seven red-tailed hawks. It destroyed an entire nesting family of great horned owls who had become local celebrities near Minneapolis' Lake Nokomis.
"When you lose a breeding couple like that, it always catches your attention," Hall said. "It makes you wonder what effect it has on the population."
Most raptors infected with the virus exhibit obvious indications of distress, such as continuous convulsions, screeches of anguish, and difficulty sitting up or moving. The owl that lived, on the other hand, displayed significantly milder symptoms, according to Hall.
She was visibly sick, as she refused to fly and had to be scooped up off the ground by hand. The owl, on the other hand, experienced no convulsions or other serious symptoms. Hall speculated that it may be because she was never exposed to a large dosage of the virus or that something in her DNA rendered her immune to the sickness.
Waterfowl nearly always have some version of the virus, generally a less infectious variety. The virus originated alongside ducks and geese and causes little harm or spread to other species. However, every now and then, a very infectious and harmful strain appears, according to Michelle Carstensen, animal health program coordinator for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
The virus spreads across duck and goose populations as they move from Europe to Nova Scotia, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Upper Midwest. It infects the owls, hawks, and eagles that eat them. The virus is most active in the spring, when the chilly, damp weather permits it to live in excrement and corpses. Scavengers and even shoe soles transport it to chicken coops and poultry farms. Outbreaks usually end in the summer, when the weather is warm and dry, and the virus can't survive outside of a host for nearly as long, according to Carstensen.She claims that it is impossible to assess the impact on wildlife numbers.
There have been reported die-offs in 28 states, ranging from five birds discovered dead together to several hundred. It has been very severe on bald eagles and owls, as well as extraordinarily fatal to snow geese, according to Carstensen.
You must be logged in to post a comment.