Prions Dropping From The Sky

August 11, 2011

A couple of weeks ago, those of you living in NZ will have seen on the news that more than a thousand prions had seemingly “dropped from the sky” and were dying. The news showed them turned in by the hundreds to Wellington Zoo and Massey University Wildlife Ward in Palmerston. This also occurred north of Auckland, and we had a number brought to us by the general public and local vets. Many people thought they were penguins, but prions are actually a petrol. They’re a sealiving bird, and can take off from the water or by leaping into the wind from cliff edges. However, petrols cannot take off from land, so if they ground away from the sea they sit there and slowly die, or are killed by dogs and cats. The prions we received were starving and dehydrated, so we had to administer electrolytes, saline solution, and eventually pureed fish. They also needed to be kept warm. Unfortunately, during this crisis we discovered that our old incubator (which had been kindly donated by Auckland Zoo many years ago), had given up the ghost. So we used hot water bottles instead. No-one knows why prions grounded in such huge numbers, but it is assumed that it was connected to the major storm that preceded it. We hope for their sake that it never happens again, as more than half perished. As you can see from the photo, they’re an adorable bird, with a gentle sweet nature to match.