| ORSON (WELLS) | |
 | Orson (Wells), a grey seal pup, was found in Wick harbour, he had been separated from his mother in the terrible storms in the far north of Scotland. He was almost fully weaned from his mother and was in the process of losing his white coat. Normally a seal of Orson´s size would be fine to leave out in the wild but unfortunately he had a very nasty wound on his abdomen. He needed lots of medication and nursing to help heal his wound as it was very deep. On arrival, Orson weighed 33kg and was approximately three weeks old. |
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Orson is another well behaved grey seal pup he has always been good at letting us treat his wound as it must have been very uncomfortable. Cleverly, he learned that if he lay on the drain in his pen it would quickly fill his pen with water, unfortunately this also meant that he regularly flooded the nursery too!
He moved into the weaning pool to learn to eat fish underwater but he refuses to eat without help from one of the animal care staff ,so we have had to bring him back into the nursery for a period of training in swallowing for yourself. He´s a bit of a daft lump at the moment and we hope that he will catch on soon. |
| UPDATE: January 2006 Orson was moved out to the weaning pool after Christmas, but despite his apparent calm and capability he didn´t learn how to eat for himself in the water. He was moved back in to the nursery where we are encouraging him to hand feed over the edge of the pen. When he has worked this out he should be able to have another go in the weaning pool. He is no longer the big fat lump he was when he arrived as he has lost a lot of his weaning fat, this is perfectly normal for a grey seal at this stage. He is a gentle lump, slightly less than intelligent! |
| UPDATE: May 2006 Orson was released back into the wild earlier this month to the joy of the Animal Care Team. |
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