Poop Shoot

This is the name Kamala has given to Mortimer since we discovered his interesting pooping habits.  I will let Kamala explain:  "Mortimer stands up, raises his butt high and shoots the poop out.  This means the poop gets all over the sides of his box but keeps him clean. He is a grey lined hawk and all his names are Mortimer, Mort, Dylan and Poop Shoot.  Good night"  We are all pretty amazed at this ingenious method of keeping his nest clean.  Since we had no idea about this method at first we just had a few cloths around the bottom of the box he was brought to us in.  We have now upgraded him to a bigger box, lined it with a garbage bag and then lined all around with cloths which we change and wash daily.  

We all definitely feel like parents to a newborn baby around here.  Carl removed the three bot flies from the left side of his face, I am counting the poops and equating that with doing well, we are on the look out for any moving living creature that could possibly provide sustenance to Mortimer and when he threw up the other morning we all spent the day fretting if he was ok.  Kamala says we are foster parents but human foster parents to a bird.  And it seems our baby is doing well.  He is making soft tweeting noises, standing up more, growing more feathers and today he started stretching out his wings and holding pieces of meat in his talons and biting at that.  Oh yes, I am feeling those maternal instincts abounding!!

Bot fly removal.....soooooo gross!!

Wing stretch number one......

One sided wing stretch......still to capture the full wing stretch on camera......

Mortimer on day 5 with us.....so attentive and intelligent....if we do say so ourselves :)!!