More gold in them thar hills

Gold, gold and more gold. Yesterday I took in the 14th golden eagle of the year. Considering I've only had 22 birds since the first of January, that's a very large percentage of these magnificent birds. The bottom photo is of RIO. She came up from Green River in a very starved condition but nothing seems to be wrong with her. I was told that there is a very low rabbit population in that area and altho this is a three year old bird, she just couldn't apparently find enough to eat.

The other photo is CHOOY (she was found near the railroad tracks). I got a call from a very nice man whom I met a few years ago. Gus had found an injured golden eagle when he was 16 years old and decided to help her back to health. When I met both of them Gus had just celebrated his 56th birthday and the eagle was still with him. Before you get all upset about his keeping her, he got her before the law was passed making that illegal. He can never own another one but he was allowed to have her until she died. And she did a couple years after I met them. This time Gus had noticed an injured baby eagle when he was hiking near his home and called me the next morning. He climbed into my truck and directed me to the place he'd seen her. Good heavens, it was the muddiest drive I'd been on in a long time and was wondering if even with 4WD we'd make it out of there.

The year old bird was right where he'd seen her and after a bit of a chase she was caught. We managed to drive out with no problem so I headed back to Cody after dropping Gus off at his home. A trip to the vet showed either a massive infection in her left wrist joint or a tumor. Today she went in for an exam under anesthesia and it turned out to be an infection. Now she's on antibiotics with the hopes it will clear up and she can fly again. She is also very thin but has a super appetite. She also had the largest lice infestation I've ever seen in a bird. After spraying her with something to kill them I wrapped her in a towel for a trip back to the vet. When I removed the towel I found many hundreds of dead lice on it and even more on her. She's been sprayed three times now and I can imagine how much better she's feeling now that those thousands of biting bugs aren't on her. The bad part is that she'll have to be resprayed weekly for a few weeks to take care of the eggs that will hatch.