Issy is so Happy!

Isadora Issy Spider Monkey finally has her palace!! Thanks to all of your donations, and a great construction crew we moved her in about a week ago!

At first she was a little scared of the vines and still is just now getting into the barrel to sleep, but she loves the space! My friend Carol came to visit and said she seems so much calmer! She is tired after running around so much! We visit several times a day and she is always excited to see us and show off her latest leaps and acrobatics.

She is now mastering the vines. We still have to paint the roof green and do lots more decorating of vines and plants, but it is complete!!

She shares her habitat with the 2 curassows (who are also loving the flight area and high perches) and a pair of Swainson's toucans. The toucans we had in the smaller cage on the side for a day, planning on putting them in with her after a couple of weeks of adaptation. The morning after we moved the toucans into the side cage, Jorge came running in to wake me up, "The toucans are missing!" We took off across the lawn to find the toucans in the cage with Issy, she had opened the inner door and invited them in! They are all getting along and seem to be one large happy family...Amazing.

New Arrival Twili, short for Lily2...and because she has bitten me in the neck, so she is named after the Twilight series! Twili was found on the ground by some kind folks in the Guapiles area and came in from the Minae office in that area. She weighs only 505 grams and is very tiny! She is getting along really well, and Milo cannot stop licking her! She loves her froggy and is keeping me up all night long :)

Pokey also came in from the same office in Guapiles with severe bite wounds from a dog or large cat...she was out on her own for quite some time before she was found and was really suffering. She is a juvenile mexican hairy porcupine, like Quilla. She is having touble with one of the wounds in her back leg and has trouble walking, and is currently living with Janet the vet who had to open up all the wounds since they were infected. She has a great appetite, and is recovering nicely, so she will join us soon.

Prince the large hawk will be moving into his incredible habitat next week!! He will also be a happy camper.

Will send photos.

I sit on the porch and can watch the macaws and amazons in their new cages, Issy swinging around in hers, the hawks cage under construction, Jou Jou the kinkajou sound asleep in her new area, the second guest house now under way and I think "My dreams are coming true!" I am so blessed.

Construction Update!

Jou Jou, Kinkajou's Enclosure is finally done!!! It's been very busy here, we don't have many guests in the Bed and Breakfast now, as it is green season, but we are always busy with the animals! Jou Jou was very shy about her new enclosure, at first she had to smell everything, then hide in her box, then come out for her favorite banana, then she got comfortable with me sitting on a wooden stump for an hour playing with her and she is now a happy camper. The first night out she had a stand off with the whistling ducks, they surrounded her cage and she was paceing back and forth, then the ducks got bored and left her alone. She did get a few minor sores on her feet from the cement, but we have fixed that now by adding hay to the bottom of the enclosure. We still need to decorate it with bromeliads from the farm...I'm sure she will love to destroy them!




Charley the Scarlet macaw is now staying out all the time!! She is loving being outside and as you can see, although she is severly handicapped she enjoyed taking her first rainbath!



Our little terror Georgie has been enjoying the sunny days and now can reach out to the almond trees we planted next to the outside climbing gym and can have a snack when he wants!

Please consider a donation to the Teresa fund!! Teresa mottled owl was dropped off here about a week ago, friday night. I was just settling down to dinner and TV (I know it's a bad habit, but relaxing) and I received a phone call from La Condessa hotel in San Rafael. They had our brochure and were trying to identify an owl that their driver had picked up on the side of the road. They said the wing was "bad" and they wondered if they could bring her down. So, I said, yes and at 9pm they arrived with Theresa, a juvenile mottled owl. She was in shock and not feeling very well with her broken wing. She was very dehydrated and in pain. I gave her electrolytes, pain medication, antibiotics, and basic first aide treatment for the wing, it was not severly mangled like the other wings I have seen, but the point of the bone was sticking out. The next morning I was trying to figure out what to do with the broken wing, I thought maybe it could be saved.

I had had a visit from the vet who works at the downtown zoo just a few weeks ago. He was telling me about starting a Raptor Foundation and about the various surgeries he has performed (bone grafts, pins, complicated orthopedic surgeries) to save wings. My first thought was to call him and see what he could do for Teresa. I have a vet on staff now, but she does not do orthopedic surgery like this, so for us it was the consideration of a "double expense". After talking it over with my vet, we decided to take her into the zoo and meet the orthopedic surgeon. He said it would be complicated, but gave her a 50% chance of recovering the wing.

We have so many owls with amputated wings that we felt that if we can give Teresa a chance of keeping the wing we needed to do this for her well being. So, a very long surgery ensued and she is now back with us. She has two internal pins, a outside fixator for the pins and a small bone graft. In two months we will know if she will regain use of the wing...it's going to be a long wait.....and of course expensive...so please consider a Teresa donation to the Toucan Rescue Ranch!!! She will need another surgery to remove the pins once the wing has healed.

My good friend Carol has volunteered to give Teresa flying lessons if and when we get to this point!! She will need to have daily exercise in hopes of release...but for now we are in intensive post opps.

Coco and Lulu are now weaned and in a small cage learning to eat fruits on their own, they had a few setbacks, but are now doing really well.

Millie, Milo and Georgie love hibiscus flowers and we have planted an entire hedge of them so that we are sure there are no chemicals on them!! Yummy treat!

I took this photo of Jorge helping with the construction of Issy's enclosure...note his constant companion and supervisor Josie the goose!

The enclosure will be completed this next week. Very exciting!

Isadora Issy, and I had a fun play afternoon in Jou Jou's enclosure. Before we moved Jou Jou in, I took Issy over there to see her reaction and to start getting her used to being away from the porch. For the first five min. she would not let go of me, but after some coaxing and encouraging she would leave me for a few seconds, and 10 min. later she was having fun exploring. I think she will love her new huge enclosure. It is 8x7 meters. We are going to have a decorating party when it is complete!!

Still trying to get the perfect photo!! Here is the Scintillant, smallest hummer in CR in our front yard!

Our good friend Rita, from Casa Bella Rita Bed and Breakfast donated this display case for our store! Now we have eveything in one place and it looks great on the porch.

Thank You Rita!!

The official greeters, the ducks have taken over the railings.

Summer Update!

It's been two weeks now and the little squirrels are doing great. One morning I was taking the birds outside to the flight, when the neighbor called me through the fence, shaking the bushes! I wondered what was up, and he said that he had just found a nest of baby squirrels on the ground all torn up! There were two babies that he picked up, one had just opened her eyes, the other still had her eyes closed.
He passed them through a hole in the fence, I showed the babies to my mother who was here visiting and she was very excited. She loves to tell the story of when I was younger in school, living here in Costa Rica, we had a pair of squirrels that lived with us. One day I went to school with my favorite squirrel hiding under my long hair, the teachers did not see the humor and asked my mother to come pick up the squirrel....So there we were years later looking at baby squirrels, remembering the fun times we had had. I called the vet and she alerted me that being so young they would be very difficult to get started on milk and raise, that they would probably die...well, now that's a challenge! So, we set out to give these little ones a chance at life, every 3 hours around the clock, fresh goats milk and pedialyte and as you can see they are doing great! We have so many squirrels here in the yard, hopefully when they are older they will find some friends to teach them about living outdoors!

Corazon (heart in spanish) Is recovering well from his amputated wing. Soon he will be able to be outside in a handicapped flight cage. I'm sure he will feel better once outside with all the night sounds and activity. Currently he is in physical therapy learning how to hop and get around off balance. He is our 3rd owl with amputation, so now we have the routine down! Last week another owl came in needing amputation as well, a Mottled owl, with bones exposed, but unfortunately he died the next day of internal injuries before the operation. That's how it is sadly. We can save some, others pass on.

The Amazons are recovered, gaining weight and are no longer the quiet stressed out birds that came in. Now they are super loud, and having a blast in the new enclosure that we built for them...well actually we built it for Jou-Jou the Kinkajou, but we had a design problem with the roof, for the Kinkajou it was dangerous, so we did a switch and put the Amazon parrots here and they are loving it. Our porch is almost clear of cages!! Lorita, the two new Amazons (we need names!) and Bella are here, as well as handicapped Charly, Scarlet macaw. Charly is still inside her smaller cage, as we are building a handicapped jungle gym for her. Once that is complete, she will be able to be in the larger area. They are all getting along well...whew! It's just very loud!

So, now we have started Jou Jou the Kinkajou's enclosure and it's actually almost finished! We love the design and style of these cages, they are elegant, simple and very spacious. Cement floors with drains make it easy to just hose down. Each one of these cages cost $900.00, so please keep that in mind if you are able to do any fund raising projects for us!!

We had our first guest request to help with taking a little stray kitten back to the States! Carol Beck and her lovely family found this little kitten on the side of the road one night in Guanacaste. They were staying their last two nights in Costa Rica with us and asked if we could help with the paperwork and vet care to be able to take little Corazon back to the states. He was absolutely adorable and loving his new pampered life! They call him the black panther from Costa Rica. I loved the name so much, we named the Black and White owl in his honor. Janet the vet spent two days running around getting all the papers, shots, carriers etc. and now little Corazon is in San Diego, with his loving new family.

For the rainy season we have actually had very sunny mornings, so the sloth's have been outside on their perch getting some much needed exercise.

And for all of you that have met Ralph the whistling duck on our tours, he says hi!

Next up is Issy, Isadora Spider Monkey's enclosure/palace and then finally Prince the hawk!!! We need to do some major fund raising for the hawk, as it needs to be a tall flight cage with plenty of room for his huge wingspan!....and then eventually our sleepy sloths!

Hope you all had a wonderful summer, we are bracing for our heavy rains this time of year :) Thanks to everyone who has toured or stayed with us, and who have sent in donations...as you can see, these do go directly to our rescued animals and are put to very good use.

Toucan Mom, Sloth Mom and now Owl Mom

We have been super busy with Raptors lately, this young Spectacled owl came in two weeks ago, from the Caribbean side of the country. Some folks found her on the ground and took her in. The problem is that they also clipped all her wings. Unfortunately when this happens it can take a year to grow out...so she is stuck here with us. We have a large adult Spectacled owl that I have always wanted company for, and indeed he has accepted her well and they are together in a huge enclosure, but for now I have her in a large cage within the cage while we make sure that she is adjusting and eating well. This is the type of situation, that if they had left the baby alone, in the trees, the parents would come and feed it. Education is very important and we will be talking about her to our visitors. She is very large, like 15 inches, and looks like cotton candy with claws.


This Black and White owl also came from the Caribbean with horrible injuries in the wing...all the tendons and blood vessels were gone, so the vet decided the only way of fighting infection and problems would be to amputate the wing, so he survived the surgery and is actually doing very well. He is the third owl that we have with an amputated wing. It's a long recovery process, which we are just beginning. Once he heals from surgery we will be doing extensive therapy with him to re-gain his balance. This marks owl number 14 in our program! Amazing creatures that I never imagined I would be working with :)



Our Barred Hawk is getting along really well, eating tons, and adjusting to life at the ranch. I was able to speak with the veterinarian who initially treated him and we spent a long time on the phone discussing his situation. He has actually been in captivity for 6 months now. He was found on a farm with his "elbow" shattered. The vet in Turrialba had the bird with him for a few months, then they sent it to a macaw rescue where they had him in a huge flight and there they realized that he really cannot fly. Apparently that is why they asked me to take him. I was under the impression that he might be able to fly when I accepted him, for possible release. I did a flight test in our large flights and he flutters down to the ground. He is able to move and use the wing, but not sustain flight, or hunt. Very sad. I had my biologist friend come check him, as well as my vet, and another friend, everyone has the same conclusion....he can probably fly a bit, but not well enough to hunt...one friend even suggested that his wound looked like a small pistol shot from a 22. I asked the vet about this and he said very likely. His scientific name is Leucopternis princeps, so we named him Prince.


The Toucan babies are now juveniles and full of energy, they spent a few weeks in a smaller cage outside, getting used to the elements and now are in one of the small flights. They cried all day every time they saw me, begging for me to feed them, but they can feed themselves now, so I just went in to visit with them :)


Also new to the Ranch are these two Emaciated Red-Lored Amazons. They were taken out of a very bad situation and came in literally starved to almost death. They have not stopped eating in 7 days and barely bring their heads out of the food bowls. Soon they will figure out that there is more food coming each day and settle down. When this happens they usually start to shed the feathers and grow beautiful new ones...good thing, because once again...you guessed it, horrible wing clips.



Remember Charley the Scarlet macaw? Well look closely, she is finally using her foot to hold herself up and perch!! Only one foot works, but as you can see she is getting along nicely. She now climbs up and down her cage and gets plenty of exercise like this. (scroll thru previous blogs to read her story)

We are working on constuction of Enclosures!!! Tomorrow morning we have ground breaking for Jou- Jou the Kinkajou's palace, and then we finally got the permits back from the Municipality to make a huge enclosure for Isadora Issy the spider monkey...hopefully she will be as thrilled as we are. Thanks to many many donations from our visitors and followers we are making wonderful habitats for these two lucky ones!!

I will send photos of these habitats when finished, and now we have a new challenge, funding for Prince and his large flight that we will need to build! It never ends.....but just in case you are wondering if I ever say no to anything, in the middle of all these new arrivals I got an emergency call from Fish and Wildlife here asking if I could take in several small parrots and amazons that were all confiscated out of some trafficers house. We were waiting for the owl to return from surgery, and trying to accomodate all the new arrivals, so I actually said, no I'm sorry...we are full for now!

New Barred Hawk

Our friend Rita suggested this story to Costa Rica top 10, and so we are on the front page today!

Check it out! We are waiting to see what the x-rays show of his damages wing, and will keep you posted. In the meantime

he is eating very well....5 chicks last night!

http://www.top10costarica.com/

She is also mentioned for her famous Bed and Breakfast!!

Marley sloth Released!

Here is Marley sleeping in the huge Almond tree on our farm! Marley is the fourth Two Toed sloth that we have released! Many of you met Marley and were able to see him while he was here recuperating. He came from the Caribbean side of the country with severe wounds on his body, possible from a fight with another sloth, and injuries like if he had been hit by a car, or fallen a great distance. Initially refusing to use his arms and hand for several weeks. He also had severe infections in his feet possibly from barbed wire. He was here a little over a month and we cared for him around the clock. Being a wild sloth he did not take to the usual sloth fare around here of green beans and carrots, so every day we had to go find leaves for him to eat...up to 70 leaves a day!! We even had our B+B guests searching for the nice tender almond leaves that were his favorite.

We released Marley 3 weeks ago. He had a bit of trouble climbing the tree since it is so covered in vines, bromelieads, orchids, moss which is very usual in the rainforest. But he made it to the top and found a nice place to rest.

After he was settled, Jorge discovered that there was another sloth in the same tree! We were worried that another fight might happen...but a few days later the other sloth had moved on, and sloth fights are not common.

A week later Jorge found him in the same tree, but he had made it down the tree to pee and poo, so we were confidant that he was using his arms. Another week went by, and I found him still in the same tree.....and this week we was gone. I did not find him anywhere, so that is a good sign. He changed trees and has adapted to being wild again :)

On the other side of the river from Marley I found this very young sloth, probably recently left on her own by her mother. She was just hanging out and resting. Maybe someday they will hook up!! It's good to know that although they are mostly solitary he will have company if he chooses.

So, another successful release of an adult sloth, makes me feel good, proud of the work that we do here at The Toucan Rescue Ranch. We will be looking for Marley every time we visit the farm!

In Loving Memory

A month ago in the nearby town of Santo Domingo a mother sloth wandered into a neighborhood with large trees and realized she was off course. Local children that sunday found the sloth and decided to have some "fun" with her and stoned the mother to death. A man was passing by and saw what the children had done, he saw the mother two toed sloth laying on the ground and on closer inspection found a little tiny baby sloth terrified, clinging to her dead mother.
She also had been hit in the eye, and her head was swollen. He wrapped her up in his shirt and took her home.

That night he tried to comfort her by feeding her some milk...not knowing how difficult baby sloths are to feed he tried his best. Unfortunately she probably swallowed wrong and some of that milk went into her lungs. Monday morning he started to call different zoos and rescue centers and was rejected time after time...he then called the Minaet office of Heredia and told them: "if you don't come pick up this baby I am calling in channel 7" the local news. Fortunately they had a car that was working that day, and had gasoline (which is always a problem)..they went to pick up the baby sloth, wrapping her in their shirts to keep her warm and drove the short distance to The Toucan Rescue Ranch to leave her in our care.

As many of you know, we have raised 3 sloths successfully, little Georgie only weighed 400grams when he came in. Our guests named the little one Lily, and she weighed only 250 grams. Quite a challenge, but I was up to the task. Goats milk, feedings every 3 hours around the clock, constant checking of temperature and our little one was coming along.
She was very difficult to feed at first, and took about a week to get the hang of sucking on the syringe. Our vet Janet came up and confirmed what I was hearing in her lungs...trouble. We both suspected it was from milk she had inhaled while with the kind man who tried to feed her. Cough syrup was now a staple on her milk menu. A bad bought of loose stools from the cows milk one day, many days inbetween, and finally she was normalizing her bodily functions.

By week two she was gaining weight, her swollen eye was healing, but with a large cataract leaving her blind in that eye...but she was doing really well. We all sighed from relief and were very hopeful....but the lungs continued.
Another trip up from the vet, and still the same reaction...strange sounds in the lungs, but other than that all was well.

Week three came around and she started to reject food, and not gain weight. She was fussing and lethargic. Then she would be back on track and another day down. By the end of the week, Janet and I were both concerned...she came up at 8pm to see her one night, and by the 2 am feeding little Lily had totally collapsed. Once again I called Janet to come up, which she did, and took her back to her clinic for IV fluids. Having a vet that will come up at all hours day or night is a blessing....but that morning Lily passed away.

When I first started rescuing animals it was very difficult when one would die and I would not want to do a necropsy, however since then and in this case especially a necropsy was exactly what we needed. Janet found out that Lily only had one lung that was functioning, maybe from pneumonia when she was born...not sure, but because of that, her heart was working overtime and since she was growing her heart could not keep up and she died of heart failure. Totally natural and nothing we could of done to prevent it. I could put all the pieces of the puzzle together and realize just what had happened to her and it all made sense, as difficult as it was to accept her death.

I had a large tour coming in that morning, and had to focus on the other animals. I used to take Lily on walks around the property all wrapped up in her blankets. I took the walk alone that day, and have been avoiding writing about this, until my friend encouraged me to write her story. We are working with Minaet education and possibly Lincoln school to do an educational program about sloths and wildlife in the local schools in Santo Domingo. This will be very valuable and hopefully educational for the children. Milo and Millie will be great ambassadors for their species.

I find comfort knowing that Lily died warm and loved, not on the cold forest floor, or by the stones that killed her mother. As I write I am sitting next to the young keel billed toucans who are constantly begging for my attention to feed them....I allow myself time to think and miss Lily, but the little toucans need to be fed, the adult toucan that has been ill needs to be checked, guests are arriving, the macaws need more perches in their cage, the sloths need to be fed, supplies need to be ordered for Isadora the monkey's cage and the circle of life goes on at the Toucan Rescue Ranch.

We are setting up a "Lily fund" in honor of her to start fund raising for our Sloth Enclosure, and education program. Donations can be made via Pay Pal on our website, http://www.toucanrescueranch.com/. I am very very happy to report that with all your kind donations we are ready to build Isadora the monkey her large habitat, and Jou-Jou the kinkajou her new palace. Thank you so much, from all of us here at The Toucan Rescue Ranch.