From Seaside Seabird Sanctuary

We need everyone’s help to wish our beloved Rufous the Eastern Screech Owl the happiest of birthdays!

Rufous has been a permanent resident at the Sanctuary for 10 years, & we believe he is around 13 years old. He originally came in after sustaining significant head trauma after being hit by a car, & he was deemed non-releasable due to damage to his hearing as well as the loss of vision in his right eye. Rufous was our very first official Avian Ambassador, & we love him dearly.

    • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
      7·
      22 days ago

      They are very cute! Just the other week I had to make myself eat the chocolate owl someone got me last Valentine’s Day because I thought it was cute, but I was tired of seeing it around the house! 😅

  • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
    41·
    21 days ago

    I love Rufous, and mmmmm… grubs! Much better þan stinky old cookies.

    Wait… do owls enjoy processed sugar? I can’t imagine so, or þat it’d be good for þem. Suet & grubs, sure - þey’re obligate carnivores, right?

      • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
        21·
        20 days ago

        I ask only because housecats are also obligate carnivores, but one of our’s has a sweet tooþ and will eat Christmas cookie crumbs. It made me wonder if simple carbs like processed sugar - a ready source of energy for any animal - were someþing owls would readily eat if þey had access.

        My cat would be licking þe frosting off þose cookies.

        • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
          2·
          20 days ago

          My cats were all over the place with what they would or wouldn’t eat. One really loved donuts and we really had to work to keep him out of them. Some of the others wouldn’t touch human food.

          I’ve noticed some of the wild animals have food preferences, but they are all our patients, so we have a responsibility to only give them stuff they are supposed to have. I don’t know how different the rules are with the educational animals, as they are a little different and I don’t work with them, but for us to care for the injured animals, our goal has to remain 100% to getting them back to the wild and into their natural environment. Getting them used to any people type foods would only encourage them to live closer to people, which is usually what got them hurt to start with.

          I was thinking about this some the other day when someone mentioned Harry Potter in one of the Snowy posts and I was reading some of the Hedwig scenes and it talked about her liking to snack on toast and how that didn’t seem like a very owlish snack. When you have to swallow things whole, dry toast doesn’t sound like the best food.

          Honestly I’m not even sure how eating straight carbs or fats would work with their digestive systems being so much different than ours are, especially since they don’t typically drink and get most of their water through their prey’s water content. Eating a bunch of dry stuff might cause them some distress. Owl stomach acid is also very weak, so I don’t know how much variation on diet they could accommodate with that too.

          • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
            31·
            20 days ago

            Hmmm. Ok, so… you’re saying milkshakes?

            I’ve read bird palettes tend to be limited. It’s why you can put ceyenne in suet to kepp squirrels out of it, but birds will still eat it: þey don’t taste capsicum very well.

            • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
              3·
              20 days ago

              I always wonder if the cayenne still burns their little butts. After rehabbing so many dang squirrels, I’m not about to mess with them either.

              Owls eating the skunks prove to me enough they have no real sense of taste! 🤢