Lethargic Luna

Apparently Luna has not been eating much the last few days; she's only been eating a couple of treats when presented to her. The Roommates asked me to keep an eye on her today. When I went to check on her this morning she was sleeping on the top bunk; she was not quite her grumpy old self. She let me palpate her belly & she was purring when I did it! Normally she would be trying to shred my hand; she is definitely not feeling well. I checked & she was a little dehydrated. I texted The Roommates; The Potential Most Favorite Roommate called me during his lunch break. He called to make an appointment to get Luna checked out; I took her in immediately & dropped her off around 2 p.m.

I'm not looking at you.

Go away!

Got her in with minimal problems, also not her normal behavior.

Because of Luna's past history at the vet, they knew she had to be sedated for them to get a good look at what was causing her to be so lethargic; they also needed to x-ray her. About 3 hours later, Dr. Lau called to tell me what they found. Luna has an obstruction about 3/4 of the way through her intestines; there was nothing in front or behind the obstruction which appears to be organic & not metal or plastic. And she was dehydrated. They are going to keep her overnight so they can give her IV fluids to rehydrate her; they are hoping the extra fluids will help move the obstruction through her. If it does not come out, they will have to do surgery to get it out of her or she risks having a perforated intestine. We will know more tomorrow morning when they do a follow up x-ray if she doesn't poop anything out before then.

Keala is doing well. She was out in the cat run this morning as usual. Later she went to The Roommates bedroom & spent the rest of the day there. S'mores was hiding under the bunk bed as usual. 

Keala in cat run.

Keala snoozing.

S'mores hiding as usual.

My phone dinged around 2:47 this morning. It was a text about the results for the COVID-19 test I took on Sunday when I was helping at the HFD testing event at Aloha Stadium. I checked my email out later in the morning & clicked on the links. My test was negative. 

I had a kale proothie this morning. 

At lunch time I attended the "Wildlife Wednesdays" Zoom event on Solving the Hawaiian Bird Extinction Crisis: Through Invasive Species Removal and Climate Change Adaptation. The talk started out characterizing the number of species in danger, what is known about the threats, & what is known about the solutions.

Hawaiian honeycreepers.

Once again colonialism rears its ugly head!

The 1st solution presented was predator exclusion & control. Several different approaches were shown, starting with fencing known nesting areas & eliminating predators from the area. Predators include dogs that had killed large numbers of birds for fun, cats that had killed individuals for food, & rats that attack eggs, young, & endangered plants. 

Predator exclusion fence in place.

Chick survival also affected by El Niño/La Niña events.

Another solution was relocating birds to fenced areas to start a new breeding colony. Young chicks are relocated to artificial burrows in a fenced area where they are tube fed daily; the tube feeding is so the chicks do not associate humans with food. Since these are burrow nesting species that navigate by stars, the chicks are also relocated prior to the time when they begin to leave the burrows & imprint on the location where they were raised. They have also found other birds are attracted to the new areas when they see the relocated birds breeding there.

Chicks are removed from nesting burrows ...

... and flown ...

... to artificial burrows in predator-free nesting area.

Daily tube feeding.

Juvenile exercising its winds at night & imprinting on nesting area.

Relocating chicks is also being done to move them from low lying areas that are subject to damage from rising water levels due to climate change. Once again they are tube fed so they do not associate humans with food. Here models of the parent species are placed near the nests for the chicks to imprint on.New birds are also attracted to these areas by the presence of the relocated birds, which are also returning to begin breeding there.

In 2011 several natural phenomena mirrored potential sea level rise due to climate change.

Black-footed Albatross chicks being transported.

Black-footed Albatross chick with parent model.

The final problem discussed was the affect climate change has on avian malaria which is spread by mosquitos; just like in humans, there is little natural immunity to this introduced disease carried by an introduced vector. Currently native birds are able to avoid avian malaria by living in mountainous zones where it is too cold for the mosquitoes. But as climate change raises temperatures the mosquitoes are able to invade those areas & spread the avian malaria. I would not be unhappy if the non-native mosquitoes are wiped out to save the native Hawaiian birds!

Just before dinner I got an email from Marjorie; the HFD was looking for Medical Reserve Corps to help with the drive-through testing at Aloha Stadium on Sunday again. I volunteered for it again.

For dinner I had lup cheong, steamed broccoli & kale, Mushroom & Artichoke Salad, & chipotle sauerkraut. I was too busy eating so I would be done in time for the class so I didn't take any photos.

After dinner I did the last half of the Zoom training for the Citizen Forester Program. Tonight we did Modules 3 & 4. Because the earlier Wildlife Wednesday event has already made this most long, I will provide info on Module 3 on Thursday & Module 4 on Friday.

The lava lake at Kīlauea summit rose 7 feet in the last 24 hrs; it seems to have slowed down a little. The video below also discusses the earthquake that occurred last night. I have changed the order that I post the photos; I am grouping the daylight photos as well as the thermal images so you can compare the difference over time.

Looking westerly at 9:15 a.m.

Looking easterly at 1:31 p.m.; sorry, got the wrong orientation for the a.m. photo.

Looking easterly at 9:28 a.m.

Looking easterly at 1:12 p.m.

The Aix weather app forecast rain in Honolulu until mid-afternoon, followed by partly cloudy skies for the remainder of the period; it actually was partly cloudy for most of the period with a couple of light, short periods of drizzle. For Kapaʻau, Aix forecast rain all day; the Big Island Now online news forecast mostly sunny with isolated showers in the morning, changing to scattered showers later in the day with only a 50% chance of rain. The Honomū weather station had recorded 0.13 inches of precipitation by 9:26 a.m. but did not collect more during the day. For Marysville, Aix forecast partly cloudy skies until about midday when rain would begin, becoming much heavier including thundershowers around dinner time. The early afternoon screenshot showed clouds but no rain.

The surf is beginning to increase along most shorelines. 

Laniakea (N) at 9:27 a.m.

Hilo Bay (E) at 9:28 a.m.

Waikīkī (S) at 9:38 a.m.

Banyans (W) at 9:32 a.m.

There were 168 new cases of COVID-19 reported today, bringing the total known cases up to 80,582. There were 7 new deaths reported, increasing the number of fatalities to 818; currently there are 3883 cases considered active. As of yesterday there were 2,051,164 doses of vaccine administered, providing 69% of the population with full vaccination and 77.1% with at least one dose. There are now 145 patients that are hospitalized with 41 in the ICU and 31 on ventilators. The 7-day new case average for Oʻahu is 100 with a positivity rate of 3.3%.

Hau'oli lā Hānau e Brandton!