Wildlife

Living next to the wildlife biologist for the Department of Marine Wildlife Resources has a few interesting moments. Lately he's had the rescue hotline cellphone for stranded and injured animals. In the past two weeks this has led to us being introduced to a baby tropicbird and fruit bat that he's rescued.

The tropicbird was the first one we were introduced to. It was found on the ground near the village of Vatia. It was actually found by one of the seasonal hires for the National Park Service that has hosted us for a few Sunday morning umus at her house. The tropicbird, who we've christened as Squeaky Wheel, based on the calls it makes, was near starved. A steady diet of canned sardines and ahi tuna has brought it along nicely. It's continuing to gain weight and is starting to progress towards being strong enough to release.

The other wild critter came late one night last week. He was found by some villagers who had hear him calling. Mother bats leave their pups in their roosting trees during the night, when they are out foraging. Apparently the bat's mother had no returned to him for a few days and the villagers got sick of his calls so they brought him into DMWR.

Bats are not something that I ever would have considered cute. This little guy has me convinced otherwise. He's a little bundle of leathery wings and a tiny body. He's still in the nursing stage, after some trial and error with a syringe, he's now figured out how to use a bottle and he receives some baby formula every few hours.

We haven't been able to settle on name for our little bat friend. Sara and I have been pushing for either Bilbo or Bruce. Neither one has taken off, but nor have anyone else's names for the little guy.

Neither Sara nor I have ever been around so many infant animals. It's keeping our neighbor on a few different feeding schedules. I don't envy him there. I'm also impressed that his puppy tolerates all these different wild creatures and hasn't tried to make a meal of any of them.