Rehabilitated eagle soars into the wild

Many difficulties

With very few of its primary flight feathers remaining, the bird needed molting to facilitate the growth of new feathers. As a result, the rehabilitators initially decided just to provide enough nutrients to promote feather growth.

However, they soon met the first challenge — the bird refused to eat.

"We offered the bird a variety of food such as rats, mice, bullfrogs and chicken meat, trying to provide as rich a diet as possible," Zhou said. "But it refused to eat any of it."

To sustain its life, she and her colleagues gave infusion treatments and force-fed the bird, and gave it drugs with each feeding to improve digestion. Despite their efforts, the bird's weight dropped from its initial 1,454 grams upon arrival to a low of 1,274 grams. The situation persisted for over 20 days, during which it only very occasionally ate voluntarily until the issue was significantly improved on May 27.

Just as its eating habits were starting to improve, a second new issue arose. Twenty days after arriving at the center, its blood test showed a sudden increase in its white blood cell count.

Since its injury on the keel bonea major bone running along the front of its chest — had not yet healed, the rehabilitators treated the bird with antibiotics. A week later, its white blood cell count dropped to the normal level.

Over the following month, they continued to monitor its blood tests, during which time its wound healed, and its blood stabilized.

During a health check on June 26 last year, a new feather began to grow, pushing out the old feather, a process known as molting. The new feather that emerges is called a blood feather.

After resolving the first two issues, Zhou said, the biggest problem for the eagle was feather damage. Extensive feather damage can only be resolved through natural molting, and the appearance of blood feathers indicated that the eagle had started molting.

By October last year, the bird's flight and tail feathers had mostly been replaced.

However, before Zhou and her colleagues could celebrate, its newly grown feathers began to deteriorate in November last year, and this damage continued until the end of last year, with its feathers essentially reverting to their condition when it arrived at the center.

Due to the significant loss of flight feathers, Zhou explained, the new feathers grew out alone, lacking the protection of other feathers, making them prone to breakage.

"Any raptor unable to grow and maintain normal flight feathers cannot be released back into the wild," Zhou said. "We found ourselves in a dilemma where, aside from providing it with adequate nutritional support, we were unsure of what else we could do. Our only hope lay in its next molting season."