All Things Wild has a new education ambassador!
“Sam is a juvenile eastern screech owl with a permanent disability,” Roger Rucker, vice president of All Things Wild Rehabilitation and who directs the education program, wrote. “He came to [All Things Wild] with a head injury and punctured right eye. The head injury and puncture healed, but he cannot see out of his right eye. We decided to train him as an education ambassador.”
Education ambassadors, Rucker told Hello Georgetown, are animals that have permanent injuries that can’t be released back into the wild, and assist in animal education programs for schools, Scout troops and other groups.
Rucker said Texas Parks and Wildlife allows the organization to keep two eastern screech owls as education ambassadors and Sam is the second screech owl. As the newest ambassador, Sam will now undergo training as an education raptor ambassador.
“The first task in training an education raptor ambassador is to make sure they cannot fly away during an education program,” Rucker wrote. “We put kangaroo leather straps on their legs called anklets. Bird trainers often use kangaroo leather because it is supple and will not irritate the bird’s legs while being strong enough to withstand attempts to chew through it.”
Image Courtesy: All Things Wild
Each anklet includes a grommet and 5″ braided jesses with loops to attach a leash so Sam can sit on a glove or a perch during a program.
“Each raptor ambassador is taught three commands: step, perch, and kennel,” Rucker wrote. “The first command “step” teaches the bird to step up on a glove on the trainer’s hand and perch on the glove. Most raptors try to fly away when we first try to get them to stand on the glove. We gently lift them back on the glove while repeating the command “step” until they learn to stand on it. It takes a lot of patience to train a raptor.”
Sam will also learn “perch,” which is when he is already standing on the glove and is brought close to a perch and steps off the glove onto the perch. Once perched, Sam’s leash will be attached to the stand so he doesn’t fly away during the presentation.
“The last command, “kennel” is used to get the owl to go into a carrier for transport to education programs,” Rucker wrote.
In addition to these commands, Sam will also have to get used to having people around him, Rucker told Hello Georgetown.
“The main thing is to get him out in the center where people are working around him, so that he gets used to people,” Rucker said. “That way, when we take him out on a program, he just sits there, and lets us talk about him rather than trying to get away and be anxious during the program.”
Currently, All Things Wild has several education ambassadors including another screech owl named Ginger, a tortoise, two opossums, two raccoons, one skunk, one squirrel, and a barn owl.
You can watch a video about Ginger, the other screech owl education ambassador, below:
To learn more about All Things Wild and their work, visit their website.
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