Rescuing Cecil and Moraii

Not all rescues end well, these 2 are a sample of rescues from the last few weeks. Cecil was rescued from just outside the colony in Centennial Park; he had flown and crash landed on one of the new saplings just planted. Most of the birdwatchers of the park have my number and alert me to bats on the ground or in trouble if they see it; I'm happy to go and collect anything they find or indicate or if it looks like they're in trouble. (hanging alone and crying). Poor Cecil was in a great deal of trouble; he was quite irate about the entire situation, and blamed me for it all. On looking at him, his eyes seemed really wrong; they were mostly closed and seemed too far down towards his nose, and there were streaks running down his fur like tears. He also looked like he didn't have any eyeballs, or sunken eyeballs (severe dehydration), and I thought that maybe some currawongs had pecked out his eyes, and the blood had washed off during the rain. I was sufficiently alarmed as to request an urgent 5 minute appointment. I wanted to gas him and just feel and look at his eyes or eye sockets without being turned into confetti by the understandably stressed Master Cecil. There wasn't a lot of point leaving to suffer for a few more hours till my afternoon vet appointment with another batty with eye issues. Under anaesthetic, we found that he had no eyeballs and his eyelids were only minimally unzipped. This means it's a congenital defect, and he's never had eyes. We euthanased him while he was still asleep. Poor little Cecil; his mum did a good job keeping him alive till 11 weeks old, but she's unable to fly around with him on her as he grows larger, and the little guy probably took a leap of faith and launched himself into the sky, not realising he wasn't like other babies, and couldn't see to navigate. Or maybe during the heat stress last weekend, his mother died or didn't come back so he was forced to try to fly on his own to find food. Latin: From Caecilius, meaning "blind" or "dim-sighted," originating from caecus. Moraii was rescued from beside a running track in the adjacent Moore Park; I suspect she glanced off a car (busy road) and crash landed, ending up being too concussed to climb up a tree. I took her straight to a carer because I was driving to Auntie Jack's the next day and couldn't keep her overnight for the initial care. Moraii (from Moore Park) was one of the Furies, and was intent on being furious with me. Unfortunately she died overnight with the carer, which wasn't unexpected. RIP Cecil and Moraii Tolga Bat Hospital takes donations for our batties. Tolga is an awesome place in Far North Queensland, which has charity status. By sending donations to them, they get a percentage (and deserve every cent) and they can allocate money to me for batty expenses without it becoming part of my income stream (which makes tax time difficult). https://tolgabathospital.org/donate/ Mention Megabattie or Meg in the PayPal message box and the money will find its way to me. If no message box appears, please email Jenny to tell her that the money is for me. IMPORTANT: If you pay through the PayPal Giving Fund, can you please email Jenny with the AMOUNT DONATED and the name under which you have donated, OR just forward along the PP receipt. The Giving Fund doesn’t charge any fees (so the bats get more money) but PP doesn’t itemise out the amount, they just send a total every month, and we don’t know if the money is for Tolga or for Megabattie. Here’s Jenny’s email. [email protected]