Joey’s Pet of the Week – Wonderful Wildlife

By Scott Lackenby | Dated May 25, 2016

Hey gang! How are you all? Paws up who has already voted for me in the Dermcare Clinic Cat of the Year award?? If you haven’t, head to http://dermcare.com.au/Dermcare-Clinic-Cat-of-the-Year and vote for me!! There are some pretty amazing cats nominated along with yours truly. There’s even some non-feline entrants! I’m not sure how that got past the judges, the title of the comp clearly says CAT of the year.

Over seeing Nurse Nicole voting for me

Still no postcard from Dr John, or as I’m now referring to him, my former friend Dr John. The only way he can possibly redeem himself at this stage is to bring me home a swag of presents. And not just last-minute-gifts-I-grabbed-at-the-airport-and put-no-thought-into-them presents, real thoughtful gifts. Really BIG thoughtful gifts.

My star this week is a little bird that was bought into us by a caring member of the public after it was believed to have flown into a window in Killara. The poor little fellow was also being picked on by some not so nice Noisy Mynah birds. As you know, we see a lot of Wildlife here at GVH. I love when we get exciting exotics in. And we are all pretty good at identifying most of what comes in. But this little bird had us all stumped!! We checked our trusty bird book and identified him as an adult Noisy Pitta.

What’s a Noisy Pitta? They live in tropical and subtropical scrub and rainforest from as far north as Cape York right down the the NSW/VIC border and also in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Secretive little birds, they are mostly ground dwellers who rummage through the leaf litter looking for tasty snails and insects to eat.

Our Noisy Pitta was checked over by Dr Matt Leong. The poor little guy was in shock and his beak looked a little off centre. Dr Matt gave him an injection of an anti-inflammatory and we sent him off to a carer with our good friends at WIRES. Until they arrived, he was kept in a box in a quite and dark section of the hospital to help to minimise his stress levels. We are keeping our paws crossed that all is going well with his rehabilitation with the wonderful wildlife carer.

Well, better go. I better start working on my acceptance speech for when I win the Clinic Cat of the Year competition. Be sure to vote for me! Meows for now, love Joey xox