Hours Covered: 80-90
During these hours, I was given a closer look at the animals on the education side of the center. Aside from a blind skunk and an opossum with neurological issues, our education animals are raptors and various birds. We have an American eagle, a barred owl, a screech owl, a great horned owl, a peregrine falcon, a questrel, a Harris hawk, a turkey vulture, a fish crow, and an American crow. One of the second year interns asked if I had ever fed or cleaned them and I hadn’t yet, so she said she would show me since it was a slower afternoon. Because these are our education animals, we can be a bit more friendly with them. For example, Faith, the other intern, advised talking softly to the skunk when in her enclosure, because she is blind. Using your voice helps her locate where you are and keep her from getting to stressed. Many of the animals on the education side have personalities. The American eagle is very cooperative. She has two parts to her enclosure, and when you go in to clean the one part, she moves over to the other part and then switches with you. On the other hand, the American crow and the Harris hawk are very tempermental. The American crow likes to attack you if it senses your fear, by going for your ankles and feet. The Harris hawk usually just shrieks at you, but might swoop down if you aren’t paying attention. Fait recommended keeping the hose with you when you go in with them, because they tend to stay away from it. Some of the raptors are not available to us interns, because they are still in training. This means they were added recently, and the staff is working with them. Jane has explained how they decide what animals can be kept as education animals. The most important things it that they are not releasable, otherwise we would not keep them from the wild. Next, they need to still have a quality of life. For example, is the animal not in constant pain and are they going to be happy and content living in captivity. Our opossum is a great example. She was not able to be released because of her neurological issues (she most likely would have not been able to find food on her own). However, she is healthy otherwise, and could live safely in her enclosure. Jane has explained that there are certain animals that would never be education animals, such as fawns. They do not do well in prolonged captivity, and are too hard to handle as adults. On that note, I found out that basically no rehabilitation site will rehab adult deer. They are too big and difficult to care for, especially if severely injured. Immagine giving a deer enough space to live and then trying to clean and dress wounds in a space that big. You would be chasing the deer all day. For our education animals, we also have frequent enrichment for the education animals. Each month there is a new schedule of who of the volunteers does enrichment for which animals. Sometimes it is a foraging enrichment item like a paper bag with a mouse in it crumpled up and hidden in a box for the raptors. Other times the animals get something like a “toy” such as a hanging braided fire hose chain that the raptors can attack and bat around.
Learning about our education animals reminded me of a study, which I cannot remember the name of, but it looked at enrichment in rats. The scientists have two groups. One group of rats was given a cage to live in with extra items like toys and comfort objects. The other group had a cage with only the necessities in it. I believe the study found that when rats were given an enriched cage, they had an overall better well being than the rats in the unenriched cage. So even though it can be a pain to clean up the shredded brown paper bags and cardboard because they will drag it everywhere, it really does make a difference in the animals’ lives here at the wildlife center. I’ve heard that some of the animals, especially the turkey vulture, loves her enrichment, and is visible excited when she sees it coming.
Overall, I am having a wonderful time at the wildlife center. I still can’t decide on what animals I like working with more, the fawns or the raccoons. It’s amazing being there long enough to see them growing up. For example, the four raccoons that came in with their eyes still closed now all have their eyes open. They still need to be kept in an incubator, but they have gotten much bigger. I’m hoping that by the time I’m finished with my internship, they will have grown enough to go outside in the rehab cages. Mammal rehabilitation seems to take much longer than bird rehabilitation. Often a baby bird is ready to be released only a few weeks after coming in, but mammals stay much longer.
