A huge wedge-tailed eagle has wound up in hospital after getting on the wrong end of a feral animal trap in Gympie.
When the owner of the property near Brady's Road found the 3.5 kilogram raptor caught by the hocks (ankles) on Tuesday afternoon, he immediately called the Australia Zoo Wildlife Hospital for help.
The zoo's rescue unit found the bird alert but with red-raw legs.
Dubbed Brady, he was anesthetised to stop any errant scratches or bites as vets cleaned his wounds with saline and administered pain relief, antibiotics and fluids.
A later X-ray showed no fractures to Brady's bones.
Estimated to be three-years-old, Brady will spend a few days recovering in the wildlife hospital before being released back into the wild at Gympie.
Wedge-tailed eagles are the largest birds of prey in Australia, with wingspans up to 2.8 metres.
Though hefty, Brady is a good deal smaller than a female of the species, which can weigh up to 5.8 kilograms.
The raptors are a protected species throughout all of Australia, but their numbers are secure on the mainland.
They generally feed on rabbits, wallabies and small kangaroos, usually plucked from open ground.
In the early 20th century thousands of wedge-tails were destroyed because they were thought to attack sheep.
However it was subsequently proved they only attack poor, dying or dead lambs.
