I have now officially entered my 13th year of 'legal' wildlife rehab. Before this I really didn't know it was against the law to posses wildlife of any kind without a permit.
This is how I and many other rehabbers have started. 13 springs ago my husband comes home with a baby raccoon. It was in the middle of the road with its dead mother and siblings. He looked around just in case there were others and finding none he brings him home.
Not knowing what to really do with it, but knowing that they carry diseases and having a youngster at the time, I called the Humane Society in Ann Arbor and they gave me the number for an organization called Friends of Wildlife. I talked with a woman named Barb that dealt with raccoons and we chatted for quite awhile. We started talking about the animals that my family had on the farm that my dad was raised on and that we still used. She asked if I would be interested in wildlife rehab, that their organization was having their yearly meeting for new members that coming Saturday. She gave me directions to her house so I could drop off the little guy and by time I got there she made sure there was still room for me at the meeting.
The rest as they say is history!
This is a volunteer group that takes in, rehabs, and releases wildlife back where they belong. I am the official "Cottontail Placement Coordinator". Which means that I take in most of the calls for cottontail rabbits and give lectures about cottontails. 90% of the calls we get in are for advice. I get on average 700 calls a year. With the majority of those in April-May. It is really a full time job, but done on a volunteer basis. But like I said most of the calls are just informing the public on what to do if they find cottontails, whether it be a nest, a single baby, an injured adult.
Because cottontails are a prey animal they don't do well in captivity and can die just from stress. So keeping them in the wild is the best for them, but we do bring in babies if they have been very badly hurt, or if we are pretty positive that the mother has been killed. We also rehab adult injured or ill rabbits too.
Cottontails are one of the many animals that I have dealt with, but it has been my main animal. I love doing squirrels they are so flippin' cute. I have successfully raised reds, fox, and a flying squirrel also. I have filled in for one of the rehabbers when she was on vacation and feed a mean ass mink. Dealt with chipmunks and I am forbidden to rehab raccoons anymore.
Our organizations goal is to release these animals back into the wild and have them live successfully on their own (this means that cottontails really just become a hawks or coyotes meal, but THAT IS THE CYCLE OF LIFE). I started with raccoons and after a couple years raising them which means about 3-4 months of teaching them how to be raccoons. For them to be successful in the wild, (they must be wild). Unfortunately I had a group of about 6 babies that got conjunctivitis (an eye infection) and they needed medication. To do this twice a day my husband and I had to grab these 10 pound animals that didn't like to be grabbed out of their cage and given eye ointment and other medications., No that really isn't they way it went. My husband would grab them out of the cage and I gave them their treatments. Well it is not a fun and happy time grabbing these 10pound wild animals out of their cages 2 times a day for 10 days. It was just too much and to keep peace in the household I stopped rehabbing raccoons.
In the spring and fall I take on 'self feeding' squirrels. These are little guys that mostly eat on their own, and learning how to crack nuts. I have a large release cage in a small woods next to my house. So after they are eating on their own very well and climbing the large branches I have in the cage, during the day time I will leave the door open for them to start exploring and close them up in the evening when they come back to the cage. I have squirrel houses in the woods, and when it is time (which is really up to them) they will either start using the houses or most of the time they start building their own home and they are on their own, but I feed them all year long.
I love working with babies, but unlike rabbits that only eat up to 3times a day at most. Other animals must be feed many times a day (recently born animals will need nightly feedings too). And working full time at a 'real' job, I just can't do that anymore (whens retirement? :) ). Also cottontails are the only animals that we do what is called a 'cold release' which means that they don't have to be taught to survive on their own. They are independent at around 3 weeks of age and as long as they are hopping without falling over and don't have any health issues we release them.
People know me as "The Rabbit Lady" or "The Animal Lady". People find me through Friends of Wildlife, Neighbors, friends, and others are calling or coming over with all kinds of questions, concerns or animals. I think the animals know it also, as I seem to find animals or they find me.
The opossum that is pictured here is proof of that. This last spring my husband came home it was just getting dark, lucky it was still cold and he had his gloves on. He gets to the front door and here is a half grown opossum. He grabs it up and brings it in, I look at both of them and ask what's up? He figured someone dropped the little guy off and he got out of a cage. Well we put him back out and watch from the windows, he went to his little home next to the shed, but no mother or siblings. I fed him out there for a few weeks to make sure he stayed strong, we never seen him by the house again, by the start of summer he must have moved on.
Opossums are really sweet little things if you give them a chance. They are a marsupial and when born will go into the mothers pouch till old enough to start venturing out. Even when they are teeny tiny they look just like a opossum, just a miniature version of mom. Most people think that they carry all kinds of diseases, because they will play dead which includes drooling at the mouth and out their behinds, the slime can smell like a dead animal and be nasty in color. It's just a ploy. In all reality their body temperatures are usually too low to house germs, this is why they can eat dead animals and not get sick. Too bad alot of people don't know these facts and will end up killing these guys who have a big part in this world of ridding animal carcasses that can carry diseases. Opossums like many animals do have a function.
Here are the organizations I belong to and you can find much information:
Friends of Wildlife http://www.friendsofwildlife.net/
National Wildlife Rehabilitators Association http://www.nwrawildlife.org/
International Wildlife Rehabilitators Council http://www.iwrc-online.org/
You can find Michigan Wildlife Rehabbers at the MI DNR wesite http://www.michigandnr.com/dlr/
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