Many pet store guinea pigs are afflicted with mites, upper respiratory infections and more. These can be serious problems that are usually not apparent from a quick inspection in the store. Don't fund the pet mills.A dead blue jay, afflicted by the mysterious illness striking D.C.-area birds.īrian Evans/Smithsonian Migratory Bird Centerįor Jim Monsma, it's not unusual to see a dying bird or two during a typical day at work. Monsma runs the wildlife rescue organization, City Wildlife, which rehabilitates all kinds of creatures, from turtles to eagles.īut in recent weeks, he and his staff have seen something new.
They started becoming alarmed in late May, when dozens of birds had been brought in with the same symptoms: seizures, loss of balance, swelling, crusty eyes, and blindness. And it's just every day more and more birds." "We don't don't see the light at the end of the tunnel, as it were, yet. Monsma says staff went back through records to find the earliest possible case, and found a bird exhibiting symptoms that came in on April 11. "But at that point it was just one bird and we didn't think of avian epidemics."Įxperts say that to prevent the spread, if it is a transmissible disease, residents should stop using bird feeders and bird baths, should avoid handling dead or sick birds and should keep pets from eating them. Monsma says the count is up to 174 dead and ailing birds at City Wildlife. At first, he says, staff would try to treat the birds, but nothing worked. Which isn't that surprising in that we don't know what is causing this." "They just went downhill and died no matter what we did. "At this point we're so inundated, we are just euthanizing because it's a miserable condition for these birds.
Our role at this point is simply to spare them additional suffering and an inevitable death."
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