Homeschooling is a Hoot

(He he he)

Phil found this darling little owl as he was getting ready to leave for work this morning.  Obviously, something was wrong since she was just sitting in the middle of our road and he was able to scoop her up and bring her in the house.  She didn't appear to be injured so we guessed maybe stunned by a car hit or having flown into something.

I put her in a bucket and looked up some numbers for wildlife rescue.  I found a place that was a 2 hour drive away and was an actual tour-able facility but I wasn't sure I was up for four hours in the car.  The second place I called, sounded promising and much closer although it wasn't an educational/touring facility.

This owl was the tiniest I had ever seen!  She was probably about 5 inches high.  A quick internet search of Pacific Northwest Owls identified her as a Pygmy Owl.

The children and I took her to a facility called Turtle Ridge Wildlife Center.  She will be examined and treated for a concussion, dehydration, or malnutrition if needed.  Once she is flying at 100%, she will be release right back into the wild where we found her.  Hopefully, we will get to participate.  This means that there are pygmy owls living in the forest behind our home.  How exciting!  It was so fun to share all this with the children.  Homeschooling science for the day!! However, if she does not make a full recover or is not able to fly they will kill her.  I kept this information to myself.

Enjoy these sweet pictures.  I only took 2 as I didn't want to traumatize her.



Picture 1 

Picture 2 

Cropped picture of Picture 2

When I spoke with the rescue organization, I got quite a bit of... interesting information.  First, it is illegal for any private resident to own a raptor.  Only licensed organization are permitted to keep one.  Apparently, it is illegal to keep a raptor that isn't in the process of being rehabilitated unless you have some sort of educational permit (like, say a zoo).  Apparently, it is inhumane to keep a raptor in any condition not....wild so they kill them instead.

I decided to research a bit more this afternoon.

I will enlighten you with the information I found and offer my opinion on the value of life.

This is a statement about the migratory bird treaty act: "Migratory Bird Treaty Act (16 U.S.C. 703-712).  Except as allowed by implementing regulations, this Act makes it unlawful to pursue, hunt, kill, capture, possess, buy, sell, purchase, or barter any migratory bird, including the feathers or other parts, nests, eggs, or migratory bird products."

It isn't that I necessarily think this is a terrible law, extreme yes, overkill yes.  I just find it horrifying that you can legally murder a human baby but can't legally have a feather from a Migratory Bird.  Which by the way, is just about 99 percent of all birds, including crows, seagulls, blue jays, and every other bird you would ever see.  If you have a bird nest in your possession without a permit, your are breaking Federal Law.  I thought that I would make a statement that you can murder a baby even as late as in the third trimester when they can survive outside their mother's body but when I looked online to find out how late in pregnancy one can have an abortion, I became so sickened over what popped up procedurally that I felt physically nauseous and closed out of the window immediately.  I didn't even find out the answer to my question which doesn't actually even matter to me anyway.  A beating heart is a beating heart.  So, you can be fined and jailed, according to the above law, for taking home a seagull feather from the beach but you can walk into a clinic or doctors office and have your child die a heinous death and be tossed into a bio-hazard bag.  SICKENING!  Absolutely sickening.

No, we didn't cover this in homeschooling today.  I wish I could keep their little minds unpolluted from the atrocities of this world forever!  Instead, as age appropriateness and maturity allows, they will be taught to stand up for what is right, what is good, what is pure.  
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