My death's-head is paested on yay!

[den]

I have just picked up from two different houses two galahs who, between them, have:

-have 3 broken wings
-2 broken legs
-at least 1 punctured lung and coughing up blood
-maggots.

One of the birds reeked of decay. I lifted the wing and could see things moving in the wound. The little girl looked at me and asked "What will you do to the bird?" Her mum gave me a haunted look and silently mouthed the word 'Vet.'

"I'll take it to the vet tomorrow," I lied.

So now I have 2 galahs quietly expiring on my back patio.

The other people asked me about who to call about a dog they found in the park. It had been killed, burned and buried, hopefully in that order. I told them to call the RSPCA. I hope they find the owner. I really hope they do.

Comments

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

I think they were hit by cars. That's the main galah predator around here

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

On a trip from Orrorro(ish) to Naracoorte, once, we hit five birds with the car. I've never hit one in the US, never been in a car that's hit one. I have no idea what it is about Australian birds.

But mostly, Den, I was just wrung, reading about the birds and the dogs and what you deal with every day. A dog . . . how could someone do that to a dog? How could someone shoot at birds? (I'm actually okay with shooting at plentiful wild animals for eating, but not for random killing.) You get to see such amazing recoveries and life and pudgy little wombat faces, but you deal with the death too, and it's very brave of you.

[jenny_evergreen]

Thank you, Den, for doing what you do. I can always feel your sadness in posts like these, and I'm glad you keep at it in spite of it, and admire you for it. You are one of the good guys.

[janetmiles.livejournal.com]

What she said.

[jasonhackwith.livejournal.com]

What they said.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

Thanks, everyone.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[http://users.livejournal.com/crossfire_/]

Sucky day. I'm sorry, Den.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Last night, in Los Angeles California, a group of four seventh graders (i.e. ~12 year olds) broke into a large marine aquarium facility and tortured to death several sharks and a manta ray.

(It would have been ironic for this to have gone wrong ...)

Today, others in that class and school are writing essays on what might have causes their classmates to do this.

===|==============/ Level Head

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

Ergh. They're hitting the age where I'd hope for something like that to go wrong.

Punishing the rest of the school for it is silly, though.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

I don't know that it's "punishment" per se.

And apparently, it was Monday early AM that this took place. Three 13 year olds and a 14 year old. They were caught when they returned to the aquarium to kill more animals, and now the students at the school are said to be "traumatized" over the incident:

http://www.presstelegram.com/Stories/0,1413,204~21474~2529489,00.html

LONG BEACH — In an effort to help youths traumatized by the torture deaths of two sharks and a ray, the Aquarium of the Pacific and the Long Beach Unified School District have created a student essay forum for children to express their feelings.

Aquarium officials announced the program, "A Healing Word from Local Kids," Thursday and said it will target LBUSD seventh-graders, but will be open to Southern California children of all ages.

Public outrage was swift and great when news broke about the killings of a 3-foot nurse shark named Michelle, a small bamboo shark and a cow-nosed ray, a relative of the sting ray.

The shock was even greater after it was alleged that three 13-year-old Long Beach boys had broken into the aquarium Sunday night, abused the animals and left them to die. The youths were captured when they returned the following night with a fourth boy, 14, to carry out more mayhem in the touch pools that make up Shark Lagoon, police said.

===|==============/ Level Head

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

Ahh, okay. I'd gotten the impression that the schools were requiring the student body to write on it as an equivalent to the "write a paper about why plagarism is bad" type things. Collective punishment in schools is often enough to make me wonder. %P

[level-head.livejournal.com]

I just had an image of a thousand students submitting identical "why plagiarism is bad" papers. ];-)

===|==============/ Level Head

[ngarewyrd.livejournal.com]

you 'n me both I think *grins*

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

I think Traumatized might be too strong a word. If anything they might be peeved at being punished for what the other kids did.

Pity it was the touch-pool animals. I would have like to see them suffer the effects of an electric ray, or in hospital pulling tail barbs from a wound. Or even stung by a stonefish.

I know it's theroetically immoral to wish harm on anouther human but sometime you want to see them get what they deserve.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

I think Traumatized might be too strong a word.

Agreed -- it is used overmuch, and wrongly. You suffer far more in your merciful ministrations, and I appreciate the work you do despite its oft-grim requirements.

===|==============/ Level Head

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[level-head.livejournal.com]

It is sad. You might remember the series of incidents involving cats and firecrackers following the airing of such a prank on "Beavis and Butt-head".

Should we ban such nonsense? No. But it would be a far better world if we did not find such things attractive and worth sponsoring advertising for.

===|==============/ Level Head

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[kayshapero]

I think something's busted in someone who does that - this sort of thing is one of the early signs of a sociopath, though some don't carry it through to their own species.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[kayshapero]

Wouldn't have to be passed on genetically per se if it was a fairly easy mutation in an area that generally IS important. It could also be the non-genetic result of relatively minor unnoticed brain damage. Or even learned behaviour from exposure to others who do damage, witness the kid who was abused as a child and grows up to abuse others. "Because I can" may not be a sane motive, but that doesn't keep it from existing.

Certainly there is a pack display mode in humanity that can cause serious damage (we call it mob behaviour), which probably was originally useful for the same reason baboons gang up to throw rocks and branches at leopards.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[kayshapero]

And if the owner of the dog is not the one who killed it, I hope *they* find the #%$^ who did it...

[elusis.livejournal.com]

thank you for doing what you do, Den.

I'm curious, why are maggots in a wound bad? I had thought that sometimes they were helpful, in that they clean away dead tissue and infection. But it seems like they're a death sentence in the animals you work with.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

Maggots mean the break was a compound fracture and has penetrated the skin, causing bleeding. Maggots don't usually get into a fresh wound, so the bird had been injured for a few days-- long enough to stink of decay, actually.