This just received this morning from the Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre (SPWC)
in Napanee where the YELLOW-NOSED ALBATROSS, dubbed "Alby" is making daily
progress.
Posted by Terry Sprague for the Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre
"And the Alby Saga continues.
"We are very excited by the progress of the new Waterbird
Aviary/Semi-Aquatic Mammal Enclosure! The very generous pool donation by
Shelin Pools of Napanee has inspired a whole new waterbird aviary. Thanks to
Greg Moore (our volunteer cage builder Extraordinaire, (we have the
Isolation room to prove it!) who called Paul Gooding (Journeyman Carpenter)
of Shasta & Associates Inc. for some friendly advice about building an
aviary. Paul came out and agreed to take the project on; he enlisted the
help of Gord Colbourne, P.Eng (Designs by SunlifeVillage.com) who is
currently working on the plans! Meanwhile, The Pool Doctor of Belleville has
offered to put the pool together. So we are one step closer to having Alby
in a much better enclosure.
"In the meantime Sue Meech is working hard to secure the proper paper work
to send Alby to Dr. Florina Tseng
(http://www.tufts.edu/vet/facpages/tseng_f.html) at Tufts U in Mass. USA.
Dr. Tseng has worked with Albatross before and is more than willing to take
on the next leg of the journey for Alby! They will also have more clout to
get him right back to the mid Atlantic Ocean!
"Last word she had from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services was 30 days for the
permit! We are looking into possible flights out of Ottawa directly to
Boston. We were hoping to drive him, but there are only certain entry points
you can bring a bird through to the US from Canada. So it would be safer and
faster to fly him out of Ottawa!
"In the meantime he is maintaining a healthy weight, his demeanor is quite
spry, he is preening himself and, a lot more vocal than he was for his first
2 weeks with us. We are hopeful for him, but always keeping a guarded
prognosis as his is a long, tough battle before he gets released back home
in the Southern Hemisphere.
"He sure has brought lots of attention to SPWC and the amazing work
accomplished by a hard working team of incredibly compassionate people. We
were on CBC Radio 1 yesterday and today, they are very keen to keep in touch
with this compelling story."
Terry Sprague
Picton, Ontario
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