Foothills Animal Rescue
Wildlife And Exotic Rescue
Exhausted And Loving Every Minute Of It!
Spring time brings a mixed bag of the best of times and the worst of times. Every spring a rehabber has to hit the ground running. If you slow down or trip, you might as well stay on the sidelines. Foothills cell phone averages 10,000 minutes a month for animal related calls. Many of the calls can be fixed by phone. The easiest phone fix we literally say a few hundred times a day. If you find a baby bird in your yard, get a hanging basket make a toilet paper nest and hang the basket in a tree. The mother will come back and feed the baby. Basically, you just made a temporary apartment for the bird. No, it doesn’t matter if you touch the bird. The only bird that has that has a true sense of smell is a vulture. We know this practice sounds really low tech but, it actually works 90% of the time.
Every call is like an early Christmas present to be opened. Personally, I like the calls that allow me to go into the field. I love to pick up the huge snapping turtle; the raccoon shopping at Starbucks, the baby owl and my old time favorite are the larger mammal calls like bears and coyotes. I also love handling calls that help educate the public and allow that animal to stay in the wild. Simple tips like taking up your pet food at night and putting your cats up night for their safety fixes most our nuisance wildlife calls. Simply put no food no pesky animal harassing for a free buffet. I rarely have to loan out our have a heart traps to relocate animals when people realize if you have a food source the animals will come. I always feel like I failed when I can’t get that animal back into the wild where it belongs.
Then of course we do have the worst of calls! The hardest person for me to deal with is the person that puts themselves before the animal. The person that wants to keep that animal as a pet is our worst nightmare. The hardest thing for people to understand is that all babies are cute and cuddly but, they all grow and become a hand full! For example, we had a person call in with their two year old buck otherwise known as a male deer that she can no longer keep contained because he is sexually mature and he feels the call of the wild. Now, you may think to yourself no biggie just go pick it up for her but; many people do not realize that deer actually kill more people than any other animal in the country! No, deer aren’t cold blooded killers but, they are prey animals that panic easily and their feet are like battle axes. Plus, they often die under sedation. Life would have been a lot easier if this person had turned this animal in as a fawn. Another concern many people fail to realize , animals can transmit diseases and parasites to humans. For example, raccoons can carry both rabies and a round worm that cause a human’s brain to sell both of which are fatal.
In conclusion, let’s make this spring “THE BEST OF TIMES”! If you find an animal call it in!
