00:19 – Kathy
Help! I’ve found an animal and I don’t know what to do!
It’s one of the most common questions we get at Salthaven Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Centre. Especially in the spring when animals are becoming more active and oh-so-many babies are being born.
Hi. I’m Kathy Mueller – host of Wild About Wildlife and a Salthaven volunteer.
In this episode I sit down with Mel Paterak – Salthaven’s operations manager; and Sarah Norley – Salthaven’s Clinical Operations Manager.
From birds to bunnies and baby squirrels we talk about how to help wildlife, how to tell if they even need help, and, if they do, how to do it safely.
01:12 - Kathy
All right! Thanks so much Mel and Sarah for joining me today. So, spring has sprung. Busy time of year for Salthaven. Let's get an idea of what you're seeing already. Are you getting more phone calls coming in? Are you starting to see more patients being admitted?
01:31 - Sarah
Yeah, we definitely have already seen an uptick in the number of babies that we're getting calls about. So, we've already seen baby squirrels. We've seen baby cottontails. We even admitted two baby goslings back in December which is completely unheard of for that time of year. So yeah, it's definitely starting and it's about three weeks early which is insane.
01:54 - Kathy
Yeah, so any idea what's behind that? What's causing it? We did have a really warm winter this year.
02:00 - Mel
Yeah, that would be most likely what's attributing to it, that warm climate. We're getting our migratory species coming back early. We have a duck that likes to come and lay her eggs here every season and she's back already which again is super early. And normally where she nests underneath the brush in the garden, it hasn't even grown in to fill in yet. So, she's here before you know that nesting habitat is even ready.
02:25 - Kathy
So, the animals, I think we talked about it in an earlier episode right? That humans go by what, the clock, the calendar but animals they're just tuned in to into what the weather is doing.
02:40 – Mel
Yeah, they go by the external cues and their biology tells them you know when it's time to come based on those external cues. And you know, we turn the calendar page and we see the first day of spring and that's what we go by but not nature. Not the animals.
02:54 - Kathy
What are some of the most common questions that you get around this time of year? That someone has found an animal and they think that it needs help and yeah, what are some of the most common kind of questions that you're getting?
03:06 - Sarah
It's mostly babies. People are finding nests. People are finding baby squirrels that have fallen out of a tree and just laying on the ground you know out of their nest or baby birds. Basically it's just walking them through the steps of what they should do next and that can be different in every single scenario. So, it’s hard to kind of pinpoint exactly what you should do. It really depends on the species, the scenario, if they're injured, if the parents are even still around. So we do try and get as much information before we go from there basically.
03:42 – Mel
And to add on to that, to Sarah's point, you know it is baby season but before we have baby season we have mating season. So right now one of the really common calls that we're getting are for Canada geese who are straying further from the river and the ponds and the streams and they're coming into areas that are more occupied by people like our parking lots. And these species are super territorial and fierce parents and they'll do anything to protect their mate and their nests. So, we're getting a lot of calls right now where “Hey there's a pair of Canada geese in this parking lot and they're encroaching and coming into where the cars are going. The people are going. How do I handle this situation?
04:22 - Kathy
Ok, so Sarah you were mentioning that you know basically there's no one stop method for everybody, that not all wildlife should be handled the same way and we'll run through a variety of animals. But first I guess let's talk about the safety aspect because that's got to be foremost right? What's your advice in general about handling wildlife that might need our help?
04:50 - Sarah
Yeah, in general I mean always proceed with caution of course so always taking those safety precautions like wearing gloves, if it's like nitrile rubber gloves. You know, even if you go grab your kitchen gloves, something to protect your hands. Then also washing your hands after if you do end up handling them or more protective gloves you know if it's a more dangerous species, you know like a raptor or something like that. And then also putting the animal safety ahead too because you know they could end up injuring themselves even further if you're not properly handling them. So, what we always recommend is warm, dark and quiet. So, if you can get that animal safely into some kind of box usually with like a blanket or towel in the bottom just so they're not injuring themselves any further and then just placing the box in a warm dark and quiet environment. So, you know if you have a back room or a bathroom that you can just shut turn off the lights. Keep it away from kids, pets, music. You know any kind of external noise that's going to stress them out. That's what we recommend and then no food or water. If they are stressed or if they're shocked they probably won't be metabolizing food or water very well so we do recommend no food or water just to make sure that they can put all their energy into just continuing to thermal regulate and just surviving basically until we can get them into our care.
06:20 – Mel
And they may not even have a swallow reflex too so if you do offer them food or water they may be so depleted that they can't actually swallow that down and could aspirate or choke.
06:29 - Kathy
And then I know some people, and everybody is approaching this right out of the goodness of their heart and they're trying to do what they feel is best for the animal, and some people I've heard will want to give it milk. I'm assuming that's a no go as well.
06:45 - Sarah
Absolutely, that's a no-no in our books. Yeah at Salthaven we use a specialized formula for wildlife for specific species. So, we do order that in especially for each of our species. You know we have one for squirrels. We have one for possums, one for cottontails. So, you know most of those websites online that recommend using cow's milk or puppy formula. You know those can end up doing more harm than good. So, we don't recommend using any of those things because it's not what they're used to. Their GI tracks can be quite finicky and that can end up, you know, causing more harm than good.
07:22 - Kathy
And like Mel mentioned, we don't need these little guys, they're already in you know suffering a little bit and we don't want them also choking as we're trying to help them. Ok so let's talk specifically about some of the different wildlife and the steps that people should be taking. So, one of the most common ones at this time of year is baby birds and they have you know, fallen out of the nest or they're taking their first teenage steps to get out of the nest, and they haven't quite mastered the art of flying yet. But that's all part of the process. So, what do you do if you have found your normal songbird? Your robin, your blue jay, your cardinal?
08:01 – Mel
You raised a couple really good points there too. Before we bring an animal in we want to make sure that we are rescuing and not abducting. So, we want to make sure that this animal actually does need to be rescued. So, we recommend when somebody discovers any animal, take a photo or a video and actually call us and then we can advise specifically on that scenario. So, you know we'll get you to send us a text with that photo or that video. But you mentioned baby birds or songbirds. Fledgling birds will actually leave the nest four or five days before they can fly. And you'll see them hopping around on the ground and they're trying to figure out how to find food. You might notice if you watch long enough mom and dad are coming back and actually still feed them. So, in that situation, that's not a bird that needs to be rescued. But if you notice a wing is hanging low or it's limping or you know its head looks maybe like it's off to the side. Those are situations where we would recommend getting a photo and bringing it into us and we would say to collect it carefully. Sometimes you could put a towel over top of it and scoop it up in that towel. And then Sarah's advice earlier. Warm, dark and quiet. Put it into a box that has a lid that can close, maybe a towel in the bottom and somewhere like your bathroom away from your pets and your people and other sounds that would stress it out. But the idea would be remembering that birds are very fragile so just gently handling it with you know, maybe a towel over top or just scooping it up carefully from side to side.
09:30 - Kathy
And then, birds flying into windows is a common thing during the warmer months and they just don't see them right? They think they can fly right through them. So I get this at the cottage sometimes too you hear this thunk and it's like ah and you go and look and there's a poor little robin or something there. How do you know what to do in that instance? Whether it actually will recover and you know get its faculties back together in five or ten minutes or whether it actually needs to go into a rehab centre?
10:04 - Sarah
That's a great question because there actually has been some recent research done on these specific scenarios. In the past we would tell people to you know wait an hour and see if they take off because often they would. It was the thinking at the time that they would kind of get their bearings back, sometimes they were just stunned, and you know that could still be the case. But more recently we have updated our protocols with this updated research and basically taking in every single window strike. The recent research has said that these symptoms of head trauma can still appear up to 48 hours later so, even if they do take off, you know they could still end up not doing very well in the wild if these symptoms do appear again. So basically, we have been bringing in all window strikes into our facility, treating them as a head trauma so they would receive anti-inflammatories, be confined in an enclosure, make sure that they're not going to hurt themselves any further. And it proved right, basically we have actually had a couple patients in recently that sure enough, over 24-48 hours later those symptoms start to appear and we were glad that we ended up taking them in so, if a bird hits your window try and scoop it up as soon as you can and give us a call.
11:24 - Kathy
Okay, yeah I was thinking like concussion protocol almost like for humans and sports or something right? Exactly. You mentioned baby squirrels. You're already seeing baby squirrels so what's the process for handling a baby squirrel?
11:38 - Mel
So, baby squirrels, we often like to try, if we can, to get them back with mom. The best thing for these animals when they're really young especially, is to go back with mom and dad. So, we'll often advise our callers if it's appropriate to try to get mom to take them, to come back and get the babies. So even if one nest was destroyed, they often have other nests as well. So, we'll advise the callers to collect the babies, put maybe something in the bottom and provide them with a heat source so that could be getting a ziploc bag, filling it with warm water or mason jar filling it with warm water, wrapping a t-shirt around it and putting that heat source in there with them because typically we get calls for the babies and they don't even have fur yet, so we want to keep them warm and give them some insulation. Then we want to put the box with the babies back as close as we can to the area where the nest was, and we want to make sure that mom can get into it and out of it with the babies. So, what she'll do, she'll hear the babies calling and she'll come and collect them and bring them one by one back to her other nest and hearing the baby's calling is the important point here. So, Sarah mentioned earlier, no food. In this case it's important because when the babies are fed and their tummies are full, they're not going to vocalize. So, in this situation, no food, no water because we actually want them vocalizing and calling out for mom so she can hear them and come and collect them.
13:01 - Kathy
You're mentioning boxes quite a bit and that in the case of squirrels that mom needs to be able to get in and out to get her babies back. So, what kind of boxes would you recommend? Are we talking like a shoebox? We don't want to be using something that would hold 12 bottles of wine because that's a fairly deep box. So, I'm guessing like it like a shoe box or a low box from Amazon or something?
13:27 - Mel
Yeah, a shoebox would be perfect. Something that would be easy for her to climb in and out of. At least a box with the lid open. I've had callers who've had the box with the lid open and cut a little hole in so mom can get in and out easily. So, you can adapt if you don't have the appropriate box. You can make a little entry hole for mom to come in and out of.
13:45 - Kathy
Okay, and then one of the most prolific animals at this time of year - rabbits and baby bunnies and people accidentally, it's too early right now, but once we start mowing the lawn, accidentally disturbing nests and or dogs getting at the nest, people thinking that oh these babies have been abandoned, they haven't seen mom around for a little while. What do you do in that case?
14:11 - Sarah
Yeah, so cottontails are one of our most commonly admitted patients here. I think last year we took in 380 I think which was our highest number recorded which was kind of cool. But yeah, so cottontails. Like you said, they can come in for a number of reasons. They get hit by a lawnmower or a dog or a cat goes and finds them right in the nest. So, in those cases we definitely do want to bring them in especially if they're injured but, if they're not, if the nest has just been uncovered and discovered, then we want to leave it be as best as we can because mom usually is coming around and the thing with cottontails is that mom only comes around twice a day. So early morning and late at night she'll come and she does that so that she's not attracting attention to the nest and where the nest is. The nests are so well hidden in the ground. They basically make tiny little burrows right underneath your grass. You won't even be able to tell it's there. So, she's really good at protecting her babies from predators just by her nest, basically. So, you won't likely see mom come around unless you're really watching in that early morning and late evening and that's when she comes and feeds them as well. So yeah, basically we want to, if the nest is just disturbed, try and cover them back up as much as possible. Usually there's some nesting material mom will kind of take some of her really fluffy fur off of her belly and place that on top. So that's one way you can tell that's where the nest is.
So, if we can put that back on top leave them be, that's the best case scenario for them. But yeah, like you said, in those scenarios where they are injured or if they're caught by a dog or a cat, then definitely we want to bring them in. There have also been some studies done on dogs and cats catching small animals like that and you know there can be such tiny, tiny little punctures from cat and dog mouse that you can barely even see them. So, we still want to treat them basically prophylactically for any kind of infections, any kind of internal bruising so we do want to monitor them if we know that that has been the case.
16:26 - Kathy
And then obviously with babies of any kind, mom is going to be not that far away in general. Is there any risk while you think that hey I'm rescuing this baby that might need help, that mom is going to get involved and try and stop that rescue?
16:45 - Mel
I guess it would depend on the species really. I know there's, people typically think that if you're touching them then your scent might deter mom from coming back to care for them. That typically isn't the case unless you're wearing really strong perfumes. Birds, for example, have really small olfactory glands so they don't smell well so, in that case, your scent isn't going to be a deterrent but sometimes your presence might be a deterrent as a stressful indicator to mom to be like okay, there's predation here, I'm not going to come back. So, it can sometimes be a cause to abandon the nest. But if you're careful and you don't spend too much time and you watch from a distance then typically you should be okay. There are some defensive species like we talked about Canada geese earlier where if you go near that nest, they are coming. So, you want to be fast and quick in that scenario but typically they're more afraid of us than we are of them unless it's you know, that unique example with a really territorial species.
17:43 - Kathy
I'm sure that over the course of your time at Salthaven, you must have come across some interesting or fascinating or funny stories related either to someone has found wildlife and they're not sure what to do or a patient has come in, or any funny anecdotes?
18:04 - Mel
Well, I would have to say maybe my most memorable and really cool call was one that happened this fall. We got a call from somebody who had two bald eagles land on their property after they got talon locked together, spiraled through the sky and landed on the ground but were still locked together. So, I immediately was like okay, let's go. Let's do this. And I started collecting stuff up like getting crates and nets and gloves and Brian. I was like, I need I need assistance, so Brian and I partnered and we hopped in the Critter Cruiser and we went to help in this situation. There were a few adults there and by the time we got there they actually - I don't know how - got these birds unlatched already from their talons. Typically, I would say don't even try that because eagles also like to bite really. These were two males that we are assuming were in a territorial dispute. And they were so strong. It was really incredible actually like because they were just like in great shape other than you know, tumbling to the ground. So, it was a cool case because you don't often hear of that. First of all, it was on their front yard. These birds fell out of the sky essentially and landed on their front yard.
19:27 - Kathy
And you brought them back to Salthaven and were they okay? Were they releasable eventually?
19:33 - Mel
Yeah, we did. We brought them back to Salthaven, just treated them for some superficial wounds. Nothing serious at all. No fractures. We went back and released them the next day. We gave them a free meal while they were here and then released them back the next day. It was really cool and the homeowners were able to be there because we brought them back where they came from so the homeowners were able to be there and experience that as well. You also may have seen the story in the London Free Press because we had some Free Press coverage there and some gorgeous photos taken of the release as well.
20:05 - Kathy
Right - give a shout out to Mike Hensen right? Was the photographer I believe? Yeah, he does some really great work.
What a story! I can’t imagine seeing two eagles fighting in mid-air, getting all tangled up and then crashing to the ground – still connected.
Wow. Okay, so there are so many animals to talk about. Make sure to tune into part two of Help – I’ve Found an Animal. It will be out soon. I’ll continue the conversation with Mel and Sarah. We’ll talk about how to handle raccoons, turtles, baby deer, geese, raptors and opossums. And Sarah will share one of her most memorable moments.
In the meantime, if you’re in southwestern Ontario and need advice about wildlife, you can call our office at 519-264-2440. If you’re in Saskatchewan, you can call our team at Salthaven West - 639-999-4957.
We also have a lot of information – including videos - on our website. Visit www.salthaven.org and click on the Found an Animal tab.
If you enjoyed this episode of Wild About Wildlife, please leave a review or a comment. Your support can help us raise awareness about Canadian wildlife.