Healthy Duke

After 18 hours of rain the river is well up and the birds keen to be fed their daily rations. Duke flew in for a quick boost, with his share of grain, mixed bird seeds, and wholemeal bread.

This time last year he was pretty sick and again last spring. I observed his inner mouth and tongue to be extremely white and anaemic looking.

With this in mind I started to feed him a supplement of dried mealworm, to boost the protein level in his diet. I even gave him some liquid iron which he took initially but then spat it out the following day...proving he does have a sense of taste ! 

Anyhow he has been much more active, has a good appetite and the tongue and mouth are now a healthy pink, as the photos show !

He is still patrolling the river around the island, even with the seal hunting close by.