Fastest Things on Wings

by Terry Masear

  More than once from my patio in West Hollywood I have seen two or three hummingbirds banding together to assail a Cooper’s hawk that sits on the power lines above the garage waiting for mourning doves to fly down for birdseed. While the hawk tolerates the harassment for a while, the hummingbirds’ persistent irritation, like blowflies buzzing around your head, invariably drives the raptor away in search of peace.

  Watching Pepper spin around on the bottom of her cage that night, I think of all the fantastic feats she has already accomplished during her short time in the wild. Before she landed in my garage, this broken teen could hover, spin, fly backward, do a straight vertical, spiral hundreds of feet into the air, and buzz short distances between blossoms in the park at twenty miles per hour. And now, only a few months out of the nest, she ends up here, grounded and powerless. Young hummingbirds like Pepper who have lost everything at such an early age hit me hard, even after all of the tragedies I have seen in rehab. Their memory of flight and overpowering desire to float freely again drive every fiber of their being and make me want desperately to help. Finally, Pepper stops thrashing around. Out of breath and panting, she stares up at me in terror at the recognition of her helpless condition. And I am determined to do everything I can to give her back her wings.

  CHAPTER 15

  Hang On in There Baby

  ALMOST EVERY WAITER, dentist, hairstylist, and real estate agent in Los Angeles harbors some desire of landing an acting, screenwriting, film-directing, or other high-profile industry gig. There are a million hopeful stories out there in the naked city. And like many aspiring stars and wannabes whose dreams are cut short by the unforgiving nature of reality, a lot of Hollywood hummingbirds end up in rehab when things don’t go as planned. Because of the dizzying number of rescues Southern California facilities take in, the rehab process has by necessity become increasingly streamlined after years of fine-tuning by committed gurus like Helen and Jean. As a result, apart from injured adults, nearly every hummingbird that enters rehab goes through the same educational process.

  Ninety percent of rescued hummingbirds arrive young enough to go straight into a nest in the ICU, which serves as a nursery for nestlings and pre-fledglings. At this point, resident birds have no responsibilities. They are placed in a nest in an 85-degree incubator with dozens of helpless victims just like themselves. Babies at this stage range from day-old hatchlings to grounded fledglings who have lost contact with their mothers. Since babies in the ICU eat constantly, the consequences are predictable. In nature, nestlings rise up and shoot waste several inches over the side of the nest with the high-pressure stream of bathtub fish squirts. In the ICU, which is lined with paper towels, everything hits the back glass and runs to the bottom like raw eggs being thrown against a wall. So the ICU has to be cleaned several times a day. This is not an entirely unpleasant task in and of itself. Setting the plastic salsa cups overflowing with multicolored babies of all ages and species on the counter while polishing the glass walls inside the ICU can be a surreal and entertaining experience. It’s the fifty other thankless, lonely tasks that slowly grind down the long-distance rehabber.

  At least once a week, I end up at the hardware store stocking up on the raft of supplies developing hummingbirds require during their six- to eight-week stints in rehab. Accessories include electrical wire and dowel rods for perches; nails and staples to reattach caging; syringes; plastic feeders; springs to anchor feeders; plastic-coated wires for suspending sugar feeders; various sizes of measuring spoons, cups, and mixing containers; plastic salsa cups for nests and bathtubs; river rocks; paper towels, Kleenex, and Q-Tips; and, from the nursery around the corner, plants, plants, and more flowering plants.

  Each day dozens of feeders have to be filled every three hours and washed at night. In addition to this labor-intensive task, formula has to be mixed, perches wiped down, plants trimmed and watered, bathtubs cleaned and filled, outdoor sugar feeders kept impeccably clean, and empty cages scrubbed and repaired as maturing birds move up through the ranks.

  Rehabbers both eagerly anticipate and dread release days. The exhilaration of watching twenty sparkling hummingbirds spiral hundreds of feet into a brilliant blue sky on their first foray into the wild is unsurpassed. Young hummingbirds’ delight upon experiencing their newfound freedom is spectacular, inspirational, and eternal. It takes my breath away, no matter how many times I see it. The rehabber’s spirit soars alongside these celestial lights as they sail into the upper reaches, testing the limits of their newly discovered powers. These moments of unrivaled joy make all of the agony and hard work during their two months in rehab more than worth it.

  But as with all things, there is duality. And as my shining angels spiral into the heavens, they leave a filthy aviary behind, which I spend the next hour scrubbing and hosing down in the blistering sun. Once the aviary is clean, I am faced with scouring twenty poop-encrusted cages as everybody else moves up a level to new challenges and accommodations. Each pair of fledglings in starter cages has to be transferred to a larger flight cage, where they are assigned two new cage mates. At the same time, experienced fledglings in large flight cages move into the aviary with anywhere from five to twenty young adults. Invariably, fights break out, as some birds decide it’s easier to murder an irritating new cage mate than to live with him for the next two weeks. So a measure of reshuffling is always necessary. On top of all this, I juggle the tasks of monitoring injured birds like Gabriel and Pepper, who are housed separately, feeding the ICU bobble-heads every thirty minutes, and, most dauntingly, answering a cell phone that never stops ringing from April to August as a steady stream of emergency rescues continues to pour in through the front gate.

  Because of the high volume of intakes, Southern California hummingbird rehabbers have invented an insider’s nomenclature for quick reference when identifying the ages of young birds coming in. For the rehabber about to receive a new patient, knowing which crisis to expect facilitates preparation. At the same time, each designation carries its own special set of associations and emotions.

  Naked babies refers to the newly hatched, from one to three days old. They are usually the casualties of a mother’s abandonment or fatal injury and consequently arrive in their original nests. These thumbnail-size black beetles have just hatched from a white egg the size of a Jelly Belly and resemble baby dinosaurs. Their prehistoric features lend credence to the theory that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, meaning that the development of an individual organism reflects its species’ evolutionary history. Featherless and blind, naked babies have lumpy, oversize heads and two lines of scraggly yellow hairs sprouting from their backs. They strike fear into even the most (especially the most) seasoned rehabbers. Just the sight of a naked baby in a photo elicits an instant and terrified response in hummingbird rehabbers. A naked baby is like a romance that ended badly; the mere mention of its name starts the heartache all over again. Because of their ridiculously tiny triangular bills and mouths, these mini-insectoids are almost impossible to feed without the aid of magnification. Even with it, they are still almost impossible to feed. I use high-powered telescopic surgical loupes sent to me by my sister, an orthopedic surgeon who had them custom made for microsurgery. Being able to see naked babies more clearly does not save the day, however, because unless their mother has fed them at least once or twice, they refuse food and usually die within a few days of arriving. But before they pass away, they murder their rescuers first, as we stress over them day and night in a futile effort to get their microscopic engines running.

  Naked babies don’t eat much their first few days out of the egg, and they cannot generate their own body heat. Even in a 95-degree ICU, most feel as cold as ice. The survival rate for naked babies deprived of their mothers is so dismal that state-run rehab centers won’t even let them through the door. Nobody knows why naked babies never fed by their mother seldom make it. Some rehabbers speculate that the chicks receive enzymes from the mother that are crucial for digestion. As with
some human babies born prematurely, when naked babies die, we record the reason for their demise as “failure to thrive.” Naked babies that rally and miraculously come to life have to be fed every thirty minutes, beginning at five thirty a.m. and continuing until eight p.m.—or from dawn until dark—every day for three weeks. Helping those precious few survive and make it to adulthood and release is one of the most rewarding achievements a rehabber will ever experience.

  Nestlings at the next stage of development, affectionately termed dinofuzz, are four to seven days old and featherless except for stringy, soft down that resembles the light tufts recently discovered on some dinosaur fossils. Dinofuzz arrivals are nearly always the victims of tree and bush trimming, so they too come with their original nests. Initially, dinofuzz babies can be resistant and difficult to feed, but if they hang in there through the first night in rehab, their survival is pretty much a sure thing. Once they get on their frenzied eating schedule, dinofuzz babies morph almost overnight into bobble-heads, a designation that requires no explanation.

  Bobble-heads grow so rapidly you can see their progress from one day to the next. Although their eyes are still mostly closed except for tiny slits, bobble-heads pop up in their nests every time they hear me touch the ICU, and then they swing their heads wildly in the air, like flags flying in the wind, signaling their bottomless desire for food. The greatest challenge with bobble-heads lies in timing their gyrations with enough accuracy to pop an angiocath into each tiny gaping mouth as it swings by. In nature, the mother drives her long bill with rapid-fire precision into each baby’s throat, disgorging a slurry of nectar and insects into the crop. Mimicking this behavior, a rehabber carefully aims the long-tipped angio toward the right side of the chick’s gaping mouth and shoots formula into the crop to avoid causing the chick to aspirate the sugar water into its lungs, a fatal error amateur finders sometimes make. The rehabber’s first experience executing the delicate feeding procedure with a fast-moving bobble-head remains unforgettable. Bobble-heads have to be fed every thirty minutes, but they are content to eat anytime.

  After a few days of exponential growth, bobble-heads enter the pinfeathered stage, which lasts from ten to fifteen days of age. At this point, the chicks’ mostly opened eyes mechanically follow everything the rehabber does. Pinfeathered babies are covered with long filaments running in slender rows down their heads and backs that make them appear snow-white. These quills begin to pop open on their backs, and within a few days they burst into technicolor feathers. When the filaments first begin to unfold, they look like long boat oars with paddle-shaped feathers sprouting on the ends. Nestlings at this stage scratch their heads and necks furiously with their sharp little toenails to help unsheathe their emerging plumage.

  This unfolding advances chicks to the feather-duster stage, in which fluffy and multicolored new feathers erupt all over their bodies, making them arguably the cutest things on the planet. Feather-duster nestlings, who have stronger necks and can see me coming the second I enter the room, display more dignity than bobble-heads and are easy to feed. If they have been in rehab for a while, they perceive me as their incredibly gigantic mother and respond to my presence by requesting food with resounding peeps and gaping mouths every time I approach the ICU. They eat every thirty minutes.

  After three weeks, once their feathers have unfurled completely, pre-fledglings begin to resemble adult hummingbirds, although their bills and tails are considerably shorter. A feathered nestling has a line of bare pink skin running down the sternum that often is mistaken by finders for an injury. The breastbone and belly are the last places young hummingbirds’ feathers come in, since these parts of the body are tucked into a warm and well-insulated nest. At this stage, nestlings show an increasing restlessness that leads them to become highly mobile in the ICU, crawling like toddlers between nests, piling on top of one another, and sitting on the younger babies, who are subsequently immobilized. Feathered nestlings also spend a lot of time perched on the sides of their plastic-salsa-cup nests rapidly spinning their wings. The future is calling. Then suddenly, between twenty-four and twenty-eight days old, they magically airlift out of the nest just after breakfast and begin buzzing around like bumblebees inside the ICU.

  Once they get airborne, fledglings are moved into a starter cage. Starter cages are one-foot-tall, eighteen-inch-long wood-framed structures enclosed by wire mesh. Two sets of dowel perches are positioned at each end of the cage, at two inches and eight inches from the bottom. Tiered perches allow those fledglings who have trouble achieving vertical flight, as many do, to start flying low. Two 12 cc plastic syringes painted with attention-grabbing red nail polish are anchored at both ends of the cage above the perches for easy access. Most fledglings learn to self-feed after a day or two of being directed to a syringe every thirty minutes by their patient rehabber. About 10 percent refuse to feed themselves, preferring to badger their caretaker with loud and nonstop crying. After two or three days, virtually all starter-cage fledglings know how to self-feed, though some stubbornly continue to demand personalized food service.

  Upon entering a starter cage, each fledgling is assigned one or two cage mates that he may or may not be fond of in the future. Criteria for selecting cage mates include similarities in age, size, mental development, and levels of aggression. In general, there is little contention between fledglings at this level, as everyone is focused on acquiring basic skills such as perching, flying forward and in reverse, spinning in midair, and self-feeding. The youngest fledglings usually like one another a great deal, poke each other gently in the chest with their bills when sitting side by side on their perches, and snuggle close together when sleeping at night. But even at this tender age, a few antisocial firebrands refuse to coexist with other birds and prefer to throttle their cage mates ruthlessly. Such offenders usually can be cured of their aggressive tendencies by being paired with either an entirely nonconfrontational introvert who lets them assert their egomaniacal need for dominance or a self-possessed and more experienced veteran who won’t put up with it.

  The rare hummingbird that cannot be socialized is caged separately through his short stay in rehab. Once he has mastered basic skills, I happily grant him his independence. Of the several hundred hummingbirds that have come through my rehab facility over the years, I have encountered only half a dozen birds that fit the profile of the irredeemable social menace. And all have been, without exception, young males.

  Once fledglings can sleep through at least seven consecutive nights in a starter cage without falling off their high perches, they are promoted to a large flight cage. A certain number of birds get held up at this point because they slip off their perches in the middle of the night and are crying on the bottom of the cage when I come out to feed them at dawn. Some birds enter rehab with one or two claws torn off by finders who unknowingly placed them on cotton towels with loops in the fabric. Hummingbirds’ claws get hooked on the loops and tear out when people lift the young birds off the towel. Like having your toenails pulled out, this experience is terrifically painful for the bird. Missing claws also make perching through the night a greater challenge. Eventually these fledglings learn to compensate for their disability, but some take up to two weeks to get strong enough to remain on a perch for ten-hour stretches. Toenails that have been torn out never grow back and can reduce a hummingbird’s chances of survival in the wild, so rehabbers are forever alerting finders to this threat.

  The transition to a large flight cage presents new challenges and affords greater opportunities. Large flight cages stand two feet tall and three feet long, are enclosed with chicken wire so the maturing birds can easily see out, and have a single set of high perches mounted at each end. By the time fledglings reach this level, at five to six weeks of age, they can fly forward and backward without effort, rotate gracefully in midair, and hover for respectable lengths of time. Each bird remains with the same fledgling she started out with and joins one or two others vetted for compatibility and who p
ossess equally adept aerial skills. Birds that falter at this point by straining to fly between perches, drifting to the bottom of the cage, or suffering excessive abuse from their cage mates return to a small flight cage with a younger bird for another week. Fledglings in large flight cages have a roomy plastic-cup bathtub filled with river rocks, a potted flowering plant from which to mine nectar, and fresh flowers when I have time to raid local gardens.

  During the months that I don’t have to teach classes in the morning, I gather fresh flowers for the fledglings in large flight cages and young adults in the aviary. All the residents of my neighborhood know what I’m up to when they see me coming, and they take the time to direct me to their latest blossoms. Neighbors have been inspired by the abundance of hummingbirds released in the area. A young man who lives two doors down from us spends all day photographing hummingbirds at his feeder while he conducts marketing research over the phone. The couple next door to him keep ten feeders running year-round to accommodate the growing number of sugar addicts frequenting the vicinity. My neighbors across the street describe how they sit for hours and watch young birds playing in the fountain in their courtyard every morning. And a new couple who just moved in next door to them began planting hummingbird-friendly flowers and bushes the minute they got wind of our rehab center.

  When Frank and I first moved into West Hollywood, twenty years ago, it took me three months to attract one hummingbird to my feeder. Now, with the explosion in the local population that has resulted from over five hundred releases and their progeny, new sugar feeders immediately draw dozens of interested birds. With their growing ubiquity since the dawn of rehab in the vicinity, hummingbirds have become the pride of West Hollywood neighborhoods, so much so that the National Wildlife Federation has designated a local park and hotel as sanctuaries.