More critters down under!
Hello friends, family & rehabber pals!
Another cross-posted update as I am now officially “up to me ears” in animals. ;-)
Yesterday was my phone duty day and it was a busy. My region of NSW is experiencing an “early summer”- the temps are up around thirty degrees Celsius, that is about ninety degrees in Fahrenheit- and being from Phoenix originally I know I shouldn’t complain, but I’ve grown used to the cooler weather here in NSW over the past few years. Besides, in my defense, it is super-humid here between the river, the rainforest & the sea. It’s not a “dry heat”. ;-) It is also baby animal season, so that with the heat makes for trouble- lots of critters being hit by cars as they go in search of water & shade.
The phone calls began early- mostly tragic bird problems up in Port Macquarie. The my area started to get hit- Blue-Tongue Lizard attacked by a dog, Magpies with injuries & heatstroke, and a baby Ringtail Possum found wandering on the road. No calls came in from the north sector- I hope they are having cooler weather and safer drivers.
Anyway, the possum and one of the Magpies came to me. Yay!
The Magpie is a sweetheart; have decided to call her (although “she” could easily be a “he”- won’t know ‘til the bird gets older) “Domino”. She is eating well; I got her re-hydrated and put her into a shallow, tissue stuffed basket I use as a nest for many of the bigger birds. She’s acting very normal, no signs of illness or injury. Will pick up some Ivermectin tomorrow; we treat maggies with it as a precaution for gape worm which is endemic here.
The possum joey is really sweet- so red and has the cutest curly tail! I’ve named her “Katherine” after Katherine Hepburn for that lovely auburn hair. She (the possum, not the actress) is friendly, and not a bit reluctant to feed; she immediately grabbed the pipette and drank the glucose/H20 solution. Last night I gave her some apple and cut some bottlebrush branches & flowers to put in the little cage- she really went to town; checkin’ the place out and climbing all over, eating flowers & apple. She is what is known as a “back baby”, which means she is out of her Mum’s pouch and gets around holding onto mum’s back as she goes about her business. She will be with me for a few weeks, or until another ringtail possum juvenile near her age comes in- we always try to pair them up whenever possible. Or, I may in fact end up with two or more possums- you never know! Same with Magpies- I will probably be assigned one or two in the next few days to keep Domino company. (Must remember to put some small sticks in with the maggie- they like to play “pick it up/put it down” and “sticks”. They are really playful birds, with the prettiest call!)
So critter count stands at:
7 pet mice
1 pet cockatiel
1 pet dove
1 red-necked wallaby joey
1 ring tail possum joey
1 Australian magpie
If you think that I am not busy, well, think again! Bottles need to be washed & sterilized, my dishes need to washed & house cleaned, the magpie’s utensils cannot touch the possum & wallaby’s stuff due to illnesses & nasties that can pass (good thing I know a little about keeping a Kosher kitchen!), and I still do phone duty, help my neighbour with her upcoming surgery and keep up with all the normal stuff I have to do. I have even managed to put in a bit of time on a new needlecase for my cross-stitch needles. It is “blackwork” which I’ve never done before but am quite enjoying. I choose midnight blue 14 count aida with shiny white nylon floss for the backstitching. It is pretty, but hard to work with that floss- the synthetic stuff is hard to handle. Have also decided that I am switching to DMC floss over Anchor- I just prefer the quality of DMC and the few cents difference in price is worth it. The Green Man piece is at the half-way point, but I am super sick of green floss right now and needed a break.
Oh- I found the best.ever.software! It is called PC Stitch, and I downloaded a trial version of it. You can plug in any picture or photo and after choosing colour range, floss maker and tweaking the image for brightness & size and such, it spits out a cross-stitch chart and a colour and symbol chart. Good-bye store bought charts that are only “sorta” what I want, good bye to downloaded charts that are “close but not quite” what I want- I will be able to print and make exactly what I want! (e.g. an Eastern Grey ‘roo under a Jacaranda tree, the full Thoth deck tarot atus, all the Hellenic deities in glorious colour, John Williams Waterhouse paintings- the list is endless!) That is of course, once I buy the bloody software- it is about $60 AUS, and I can’t afford it right now. Oh well, I will try to set aside a bit of cash each fortnight; some day I will get it and then I will be in cross-stitch heaven!
Other than animals and cross-stitch and hangin’ with my friends & neighbours not much else is going on. Tomorrow I will be doing another fundraising day for FAWNA at the Kmart shopping plaza, the Tuesday I will be helping my neighbour who is having cataract surgery. Otherwise we are all just trying to keep cool- the humidity is on the rise and it is hot (as I mentioned at the beginning) and we have rain in the forecast starting tomorrow night and lasting for a few days. Fun, fun!
P.S.- Brush fire season has started early. The news tonight had a lot of coverage on fires all around the state, and tonight, about an hour ago, my neighbour and I smelled a fire nearby. Part of the work my organization does is after fire search & rescue- scary & heartbreaking stuff. I do hope we get a good amount of rain over the next few days, as well as over the next few months- we’ve been lucky over the past five years up here and we want to keep it that way. *Touch wood, knock wood, prayers, etc*
P.S.S.-Here’s a link to a picture of a Long-Nosed Bandicoot, which was the sweet baby I got on Tuesday from the vet. RIP little Andy Pandy bandicoot. Also a link to a picture of a Red-Necked Wallaby like the other baby I got in on Tuesday, who is currently being the cutest wallaby ever!
Cross posted to my personal journal rachaels_lj and rehab_wildlife.
Blinkie by brokenlette
Another cross-posted update as I am now officially “up to me ears” in animals. ;-)
Yesterday was my phone duty day and it was a busy. My region of NSW is experiencing an “early summer”- the temps are up around thirty degrees Celsius, that is about ninety degrees in Fahrenheit- and being from Phoenix originally I know I shouldn’t complain, but I’ve grown used to the cooler weather here in NSW over the past few years. Besides, in my defense, it is super-humid here between the river, the rainforest & the sea. It’s not a “dry heat”. ;-) It is also baby animal season, so that with the heat makes for trouble- lots of critters being hit by cars as they go in search of water & shade.
The phone calls began early- mostly tragic bird problems up in Port Macquarie. The my area started to get hit- Blue-Tongue Lizard attacked by a dog, Magpies with injuries & heatstroke, and a baby Ringtail Possum found wandering on the road. No calls came in from the north sector- I hope they are having cooler weather and safer drivers.
Anyway, the possum and one of the Magpies came to me. Yay!
The Magpie is a sweetheart; have decided to call her (although “she” could easily be a “he”- won’t know ‘til the bird gets older) “Domino”. She is eating well; I got her re-hydrated and put her into a shallow, tissue stuffed basket I use as a nest for many of the bigger birds. She’s acting very normal, no signs of illness or injury. Will pick up some Ivermectin tomorrow; we treat maggies with it as a precaution for gape worm which is endemic here.
The possum joey is really sweet- so red and has the cutest curly tail! I’ve named her “Katherine” after Katherine Hepburn for that lovely auburn hair. She (the possum, not the actress) is friendly, and not a bit reluctant to feed; she immediately grabbed the pipette and drank the glucose/H20 solution. Last night I gave her some apple and cut some bottlebrush branches & flowers to put in the little cage- she really went to town; checkin’ the place out and climbing all over, eating flowers & apple. She is what is known as a “back baby”, which means she is out of her Mum’s pouch and gets around holding onto mum’s back as she goes about her business. She will be with me for a few weeks, or until another ringtail possum juvenile near her age comes in- we always try to pair them up whenever possible. Or, I may in fact end up with two or more possums- you never know! Same with Magpies- I will probably be assigned one or two in the next few days to keep Domino company. (Must remember to put some small sticks in with the maggie- they like to play “pick it up/put it down” and “sticks”. They are really playful birds, with the prettiest call!)
So critter count stands at:
7 pet mice
1 pet cockatiel
1 pet dove
1 red-necked wallaby joey
1 ring tail possum joey
1 Australian magpie
If you think that I am not busy, well, think again! Bottles need to be washed & sterilized, my dishes need to washed & house cleaned, the magpie’s utensils cannot touch the possum & wallaby’s stuff due to illnesses & nasties that can pass (good thing I know a little about keeping a Kosher kitchen!), and I still do phone duty, help my neighbour with her upcoming surgery and keep up with all the normal stuff I have to do. I have even managed to put in a bit of time on a new needlecase for my cross-stitch needles. It is “blackwork” which I’ve never done before but am quite enjoying. I choose midnight blue 14 count aida with shiny white nylon floss for the backstitching. It is pretty, but hard to work with that floss- the synthetic stuff is hard to handle. Have also decided that I am switching to DMC floss over Anchor- I just prefer the quality of DMC and the few cents difference in price is worth it. The Green Man piece is at the half-way point, but I am super sick of green floss right now and needed a break.
Oh- I found the best.ever.software! It is called PC Stitch, and I downloaded a trial version of it. You can plug in any picture or photo and after choosing colour range, floss maker and tweaking the image for brightness & size and such, it spits out a cross-stitch chart and a colour and symbol chart. Good-bye store bought charts that are only “sorta” what I want, good bye to downloaded charts that are “close but not quite” what I want- I will be able to print and make exactly what I want! (e.g. an Eastern Grey ‘roo under a Jacaranda tree, the full Thoth deck tarot atus, all the Hellenic deities in glorious colour, John Williams Waterhouse paintings- the list is endless!) That is of course, once I buy the bloody software- it is about $60 AUS, and I can’t afford it right now. Oh well, I will try to set aside a bit of cash each fortnight; some day I will get it and then I will be in cross-stitch heaven!
Other than animals and cross-stitch and hangin’ with my friends & neighbours not much else is going on. Tomorrow I will be doing another fundraising day for FAWNA at the Kmart shopping plaza, the Tuesday I will be helping my neighbour who is having cataract surgery. Otherwise we are all just trying to keep cool- the humidity is on the rise and it is hot (as I mentioned at the beginning) and we have rain in the forecast starting tomorrow night and lasting for a few days. Fun, fun!
P.S.- Brush fire season has started early. The news tonight had a lot of coverage on fires all around the state, and tonight, about an hour ago, my neighbour and I smelled a fire nearby. Part of the work my organization does is after fire search & rescue- scary & heartbreaking stuff. I do hope we get a good amount of rain over the next few days, as well as over the next few months- we’ve been lucky over the past five years up here and we want to keep it that way. *Touch wood, knock wood, prayers, etc*
P.S.S.-Here’s a link to a picture of a Long-Nosed Bandicoot, which was the sweet baby I got on Tuesday from the vet. RIP little Andy Pandy bandicoot. Also a link to a picture of a Red-Necked Wallaby like the other baby I got in on Tuesday, who is currently being the cutest wallaby ever!
Cross posted to my personal journal rachaels_lj and rehab_wildlife.
Blinkie by brokenlette