Matt Clement
What we’ve seen Ryk is over the last few weeks private practices across the state quite rightly I might add have obviously weighed up the risk and the expense of having to deal with this situation and a lot of them have decided that it’s better that they don’t handle wild birds and leave it to those specialist facilities like like Bonorong Wildlife Hospital.
Ryk Goddard
For you what does that mean in terms of load?
Matt Clement
Yeah it basically means our caseload is has risen by around about 30 per cent currently so since July we’ve seen quite a dramatic uptick in the number of birds coming through in part I would imagine that’s because the public is more aware of the situation and is now tending to report a lot of cases that perhaps otherwise they wouldn’t but yeah essentially August and September on track for a 30 per cent plus increase on caseload.
Ryk Goddard
Are you seeing any other animals that are coming in that have been affected by bird flu as well? I sure no one’s bringing them into Bonnerong but are there other animals where it’s crossing over?
Matt Clement
No well look to be honest Ryk what we’re trying to do is keep the infected animals away from Bonorong because it does prevent it or it creates I should say an existential issue for us in that an infection at Bonorong has such a an impact on the way that we treat other animals you know it puts them at risk essentially that we’ve been trying to insulate Bonorong the best we can. So far the only cases that we’ve triaged and detected have been in birds we haven’t seen the spread to mammals but having said that the experts are telling us that this sort of expansion of the disease through Tassie is consistent with what’s happened in other countries and we know that at some point in the future it is going to start to affect mammals more often.
Ryk Goddard
What can people do to help Bonorong?
Matt Clement
Look I think the biggest thing honestly is to follow NRE’s guidelines you know don’t touch sick and injured birds just leave them alone call them through make sure you keep your dog away from that animal report it to Bonorong Wildlife Rescue Service or contact NRE’s number we have a really well established protocol now for escalating these animals to the appropriate authorities for treatment and that’s really the best you can do. The other thing I’d say I guess to locals is if you do find a sick or injured bird please do not bring it to Bonorong without calling us first that is really really important.