September 25, 2026 - Mark Primiano, Guest Birder
SKW BOTD Behind the Scenes: So the bursa sac in my Achilles that ruptured two years ago is immensely inflamed, but not yet leaking, according to the emergency ortho visit that happened today. Ice and walking boot and rest. But I have a recovery plan. Stay tuned for a nice crop of guests while I do low effort birding for 7-10 days. And for my first guest...
Mark Primiano is known to my family as "Dr. Mark" because I once inveigled him into joining a Zoom girl scout meeting to help my niece's troop achieve their Animal Helpers badge. I did this by the method of asking him nicely on Bluesky, to which he said "Of course!" When I asked, "Does anybody want to guest post on a niche bird blog with very short notice?" it did not surprise me that he would say "Of course!" A great shelter vet, and a great guy. There will be more of these from him, so smash that subscribe button.
Where: June 23, 2018
When: The Animal Foundation, Las Vegas, NV
Bird of the Day: Great Horned Long-eared Owl
"Any available shelter vet to intake, any available shelter vet to intake.” 99 out of 100 times, this page was not terribly interesting or exciting to answer. Which is not to denigrate the many dogs and cats that came through the shelter, but there are only so many times you can go "send it to respiratory iso" before you become a broken record. This one was different.
I walked into the little trailer that was our intake ward at the time due to construction and everyone was grinning. "Doc, look!" and they hand me a juvenile owl. Apparently it had stunned itself by flying directly into the side of Circus Circus Casino and animal control brought it to us to have it looked over before wildlife rescue could take it. Being the vet on staff who took a course on exotic animals most recently (a.k.a. the most recent graduate), I got to pretend I remembered anything other than "holy shit, that is an owl!"
Owls always feel so cool to see in person because you aren't really supposed to get to see them in person, so I never figured I would get to hold one. Especially in the middle of the desert. He checked out healthy enough and would eventually be sent back into the wild.
Want in on this? Send your bird thoughts and/or photo to skwbotd@gmail.com to be in the Back-Up Bird Bank.
