Check Out Some Hope for Wildlife Videos!The sounds of Spring... For some, the shift into warmer weather comes with the melodic notes of songbirds, or maybe the gentle peeping of frogs. For Sullivan's Pond, it's the boisterous honking of geese! The Sullivan's Pond geese who spend their winters with us here at Hope for Wildlife have returned to their summer home at Sullivan's Pond in Dartmouth. As usual, they excitedly, and more importantly vocally, announced their return. They are beloved members of their community, and everyone looks forward to their springtime return. The geese have been at Sullivan's Pond for decades, entertaining the locals, directing traffic, and basically thinking they run the place. Since they are domesticated animals, they vacation with us in the winter and take advantage of our huge enclosures, heated water dishes, and indoor shelters - but nothing compares to their summer home on the pond. ____________________________________________________________________ Try to stay out of trouble! This Great Horned Owl was found with it's face full of porcupine quills. Every once in a while we get a bird of prey with quills in the feet or face, perhaps because it was their first attempt a porcupine meal and they learned an important lesson the hard way! As we were removing the quills we also noticed the owl smell like skunk spray. That's actually less surprising, since these owls have a very limited sense of smell, so they frequently hunt skunks. Their hunting is driven mainly by hearing and vision, so the skunk’s defensive spray which is designed to repel mammals with sensitive nose has limited deterrent value for owl that don't care that they stink. Thanks to Brett, who found the owl, and to releasers Mike and Dara for the great release video.
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