KALAMAZOO, Mich. \u2014 Earlier this month, a great horned owl was found discarded on the side of the road in South Haven Township.<\/p>\n
The owl was tied up in an empty feed bag with some air holes cut into it by property owners on Dec. 6, who originally thought the bag was trash before realizing something was inside.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt makes all of us very sad,\u201d Loeise Sagaert, founder and executive director of Wildside Rehabilitation and Education Center, said. \u201cIt kind of makes me lose hope with people and the human race.\u201d<\/p>\n
A zip-tie was bound tightly around the owl\u2019s ankle, causing severe restriction and swelling to her foot.<\/p>\n
She was originally brought to West Michigan Wildlife Center in Grand Rapids for care, where she was given pain medication, antibiotics and foot soaks.<\/p>\n
They then contacted the Wildside Rehabilitation and Education Center in Eaton Rapids, where the owl is now on a challenging path to recovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe just pretty much landed in my arms,\u201d Sagaert said. \u201cShe looked defeated and she looked like, what are you going to do to me now? You know, they’ve done all of this to me already. And what are you going to do to me now? So it makes me pretty sad, a little teary at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sagaert said the owl has still been receiving medications and antibiotics daily to manage pain and infection, along with caregivers continuing to soak her foot.<\/p>\n
In addition to her leg injury, the owl is also suffering from blindness and head trauma, so she\u2019s being hand-fed, ensuring she gets the necessary nutrition for healing and recovery.<\/p>\n
And, Sagaert said it looks promising.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe foot is less swollen than it was. She’s actually perching now on a on an AstroTurf perch,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen she came in, her diagnosis was guarded at best. But now I would say her prognosis is good.\u201d<\/p>\n
The owl is non-releasable, so she won\u2019t make it back out into the wild. However, Sagaert said the Blanford Nature Center in Grand Rapids has already expressed interest in having her as an education ambassador.<\/p>\n
The Michigan Department of Natural Resources said a local conservation officer conducted an investigation, but was unable to find any leads.<\/p>\n
Anyone with information is asked to contact the DNR\u2019s Report All Poaching Hotline, available via phone or text at 1-800-292-7800 or via web form at Michigan.gov\/RAP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KALAMAZOO, Mich. \u2014 Earlier this month, a great horned owl was found discarded on the side of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":360316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-360315","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/360316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}