Healthy barn owls can help protect our community from rats.
Pet Companions Club
Sadly, we do get phone calls to rescue cottontail rabbits that are staggering or partially paralyzed. These are indications that it has been poisoned by rodenticide (rat poison). Baby bunnies will go into rat bait boxes and consume the poisoned bait. Adult rabbits are poisoned by loose rat poison left outside.
There are two main types of rodenticides: neurotoxic and anticoagulant. A bunny poisoned by a neurotoxic rodenticide will display seizures, tremors, and paralysis. Rabbits poisoned by anticoagulants will bleed internally and externally. This type of poison causes secondary poisoning in predator animals, such as owls, hawks, cats, dogs, bobcats, and coyotes, causing their deaths as well.
A single barn owl can consume 1,000 rodents per year. Imagine the difference a healthy family of barn owls could make in our community. Unfortunately, when we receive a call about a barn owl, it is either dying from rodenticide, or already dead. It is heartbreaking to see these beautiful birds die a completely preventable death.
When we receive a call about a sick or paralyzed bunny, the bunny is assessed and then taken to Legacy Animal Hospital to be humanely euthanized if we are unable to help it. This also prevents secondary poisoning from happening by removing the poisoned rabbit from the environment. Therefore, we encourage our residents to call if they see a bunny in distress.
In order to reduce our rodent population, we strongly recommend that all ripe fruit be picked and removed from your fruit trees as soon as possible. We would also love to see bait boxes being removed from the community, so that we can support a healthy owl population.
We have recently made it easier to donate to the Pet Companions Club by adding Zelle as an option. You can send us a donation through Zelle at pcpetcompanions@gmail.com, or send us a check by mail to the Pet Companions Club of PebbleCreek, PO Box 6106, Goodyear, AZ, 85338-0619.