The great mystery

     The great brown bird lay absolutely still on the table, it's legs and wings completely unable to move.   He slowly manages to muster enough strength to raise his head and slightly open his eyes.  I look into his eyes, expecting to see the same, "help me" expression that is expressed in every dying animal that I help, but that look isn't there at all, instead, his entire disposition is a majestic one.   The Eagle is the only animal I have come across which could be so near death, yet so proud.       And this eagle is near death.... he is so dehydrated that he has lost the ability to move.  His fall out of the sky bashed up his bill and chin, this great bird fell right out of the sky into a gravel parking lot.  At this point, he is barely conscious.  No one seriously expects him to survive, especially me and the vet, but that doesn't stop me from trying.  

This is the bird shortly after I brought him home, I laid him here as I desperately tried to hydrate him... rather hard to do with a half-conscious bird.

     And this bird is not alone.  This is the third bird to crash into that parking lot.  You may remember the first one, I had his picture up here in a previous blog.  That bird seemed to be doing better, but died after a few days, after that, another eagle like this one appeared in that same area around that parking lot.  It didn't survive a single night.

     So, that is the great mystery...  why are the birds falling out of the sky?  all three birds are young, one of them a mere chick.   None of them show signs of being attacked by the notorious pied crows that defend their territory with Al Capone-style fervor.  Why are they falling out of the sky?   Well, we don't know, that is why it is a mystery.  All we know is that they are all too dehydrated to move.   This bird at least shows signs of typhoid, which I am treating it for, and all the birds have refused to eat or drink.  

       It remains a mystery what is killing the birds, even more mysteriously, what is knocking them out of the sky.  It is one thing for a bird to slowly die, but we seem to be dealing with seizures or heart attacks, just so sudden is the way that they fall.  Theorys range from typhoid, to heat stroke, and even the possiblity of an unknown avian disease (let's hope it stays avian, these things live with me!)

      But probably the most likely thing might be simple pollution.  In Kenya, Garbage mixed with oil products is stacked all over the markets and the lower-class housing estates.    The dry season has just been coming to a close, and it is possible that with the coming of heavy rains, oils, dirt, and chemicals are being washed by the heavy rains into the bird's water supply, and even chemicals may cover the fur of the rodents and other smaller animals that are the hawk's prey.  There is also a study going on about the possiblity of Chlorinated Hydrocarbons being found in birds near agricultural areas, although this is highly unlikely due to the fact that we are in the city.

 

Is pollution Killing large birds in Kenya?

Let us hope that we solve this mystery.  We find what is killing these fine animals.  Almost every time a bird falls from the sky in Kenya, it is tortured to death by kids, cats, dogs, or whatever else may come its way.  These are the lucky few, even if I never save a single bird, I am at least content in knowing they died a comfortable death, and not a living biology disection experiment.  Although if they do die, they probably will be dissected, not just for highschooler's sake, but to find out why these majestic birds are mysteriously

 crashing to the ground.

According to wikipedia ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tawny_eagle ) these birds are of "least concern", that doesn't matter to me, they are eagles, and as such they majestically grace any geological location that they may be found.  Therefore I do what I can to save these grand masters of the sky.