Most of our days this month and next month are filled with programs. But the first day of this week was hard, hard labor. We had 22 sheets of 8x4 plywood that needed to be painted for Jeanne's aviary she's building and for the flight cage. Our day started with an adventure to Home Depot to pick up a 5 gallon bucket of paint. You don't realize how heavy a bucket of paint is until you carry it all the way out to the car. That took up the first hour of our day. By time we started painted it was getting hot. We were painting 8 sheets at a time; front, back, and sides. After we did the first 16 we saw that there was only 6 sheets left so we pushed through to finish them. I was so tired by the end of the day.
Wednesday
was once again our cleaning day due to the abundance of other things we had to complete during the week. We cleaned out left over food, bleached and refilled water, and scrubbed perches. While we had started on our animal care routine Mary-beth was out picking up a new rehab bird from Bolton Vet. She ended up bringing back a Turkey Vulture that we are treating for lead poisoning. We have to put his pills in his food 3 times a day and hope that he doesn't tear appart the mouse with his medicine. Turkey Vultures usually just inhale small prey items like mice. We usually don't name our rehab birds, but he earned his name. This bird ended up being named "Felon". When we was at the vet he had gotten out in the holding area and made a mess of things like tossing things arounds. After we were done cleaning and observing the Vulture we went on with our other events for the day. It was Jeanne's birthday and we were going out to look for Kestrel and then to get ice cream at UCONN. Unfortunetly we didn't see any Kestrels but we did get to watch a Red-tailed hawk fight off a song bird which was pretty cool.
was once again our cleaning day due to the abundance of other things we had to complete during the week. We cleaned out left over food, bleached and refilled water, and scrubbed perches. While we had started on our animal care routine Mary-beth was out picking up a new rehab bird from Bolton Vet. She ended up bringing back a Turkey Vulture that we are treating for lead poisoning. We have to put his pills in his food 3 times a day and hope that he doesn't tear appart the mouse with his medicine. Turkey Vultures usually just inhale small prey items like mice. We usually don't name our rehab birds, but he earned his name. This bird ended up being named "Felon". When we was at the vet he had gotten out in the holding area and made a mess of things like tossing things arounds. After we were done cleaning and observing the Vulture we went on with our other events for the day. It was Jeanne's birthday and we were going out to look for Kestrel and then to get ice cream at UCONN. Unfortunetly we didn't see any Kestrels but we did get to watch a Red-tailed hawk fight off a song bird which was pretty cool.Thursday was a busy program day, with two programs in two different locations. I got to j
ess up Silo when we were getting all of the birds packed up, and she didn't even scream at me. I learned that if you block her path by putting your arm up infront of her she doesn't fly off and you don't have to grab her. For our first program we were at Starbase again, and I presented the environment. I messed up a little bit by jumbling a few numbers in the facts. For the second program 2 hours later we were at the New England Air Museum where I did the environment again, but this time did a much better job. I think I know what my problem with public presentations is. With public presentations your trying to talk slow and smoothly so people can understand you. But when I need to speed up a part of a program I do not get nervous. Being able to speak at a faster pace makes me a lot more comfortable. So I need to learn to start talking at a speed that is comfortable for me, and then as I do a different program start talking a little slower each time.
ess up Silo when we were getting all of the birds packed up, and she didn't even scream at me. I learned that if you block her path by putting your arm up infront of her she doesn't fly off and you don't have to grab her. For our first program we were at Starbase again, and I presented the environment. I messed up a little bit by jumbling a few numbers in the facts. For the second program 2 hours later we were at the New England Air Museum where I did the environment again, but this time did a much better job. I think I know what my problem with public presentations is. With public presentations your trying to talk slow and smoothly so people can understand you. But when I need to speed up a part of a program I do not get nervous. Being able to speak at a faster pace makes me a lot more comfortable. So I need to learn to start talking at a speed that is comfortable for me, and then as I do a different program start talking a little slower each time.Last night was a fun night though. It was our meet and greet program at the movies for the Harry Potter movie. We brought all of our owls out for 2 hours in the afternoon. I had Emyrs the Barred Owl who was a bit of a grouch. But I felt like i did so well at this event, to the point where I was bringing up facts I learned in Ornithology class. This wasn't a paid program for us, just donations, but even then it looked like was were doing well. The last half an hour Jeanne had me take out Silo and present her facts. I was a little nervious because I hadn't really read up on Barn owls but I did fine. Everyone that stopped by seemed to love seeing and hearing about the birds, and thats what matters.
Until next time,
-Heather
*The picture of Mary-beth was taken by the New England Air Museum.
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