Frolicking Fawns

Few things in nature are as cute as a week old fawn, but sometimes nature isn’t always pretty. As mentioned in a previous post the best thing to do if you see a fawn sitting alone is to resist the urge to interfere. Mother deer will frequently leave their fawns for several hours at a time as they are not strong enough to keep up with her as she forages. Unless the baby is showing obvious signs of distress you can be certain that the mother will return, perhaps closer to dusk when she feels it is safe to do so.
Because we have received a large number of calls regarding fawns in the past couple of weeks I would like to take this opportunity to expand on the discussion of what to do when you encounter these situations. First, we have an idyllic image of deer dashing through forests and grazing in wide open fields, but it is actually quite common to see deer in town, especially in quite, grassy subdivisions. It is also quite common, believe it or not, to find a fawn resting in your front flower bed one day. Don’t worry, in nearly every case the mother of this adorable creature with the biggest, wettest eyes you’ve probably ever seen will come back. Having helped raise deer for the zoo in my hometown when I was in high school, I can understand the urge to want to take up and care for this helpless babe, but its best chance at survival is to stay with its mother.
This is the case with all baby animals but with deer we face another issue: in Waukesha County (as well as many other Wisconsin counties) chronic wasting disease regulations do not allow the rehabilitation and rearing of deer. Remember, if a fawn is abandoned it will show clear signs of distress like running around and crying continuously. Even though we can’t raise them here, if they are exhibiting these behaviors for a long period of time (several hours or more) and they are young enough that they allow you to capture them, then they are too young to survive on their own and the outcome will be their starvation or a predator.
We want what’s best for each potential patient we take in and that means keeping them with their natural parents in their natural environment in as many cases as possible. If you have questions about a fawn or any animal that you think needs help, please contact us or a rehabilitator in your area before you do anything else.

Breaking New Ground

On Monday May 17th the Wildlife in Need Center, in collaboration with the University of Wisconsin-Waukesha, held its formal ground breaking ceremony at the UW-Waukesha Field Station.

We have finally started, at least ceremonially, the actual construction is planned to start this June. With this start date, the new facility should be completed sometime towards the end of this year. Yes you heard right, we should be completed with our new facility before the start of 2011.

The ground breaking capped off more than two years of discussions, meetings, drafting documents and getting approvals. But in the end all of these steps paid off. The new center will allow us to expand our educational programming, provide a safer, more volunteer friendly facility, become an enhanced community asset, and of course, continue to provide and improve upon the best care possible for our wildlife patients. Needless to say we are all excited about the project. Obviously as things progress we will continue to keep you updated on our progress both online in places like this blog and our website as well as via our membership newsletters and mailings.

One thing you’ll be hearing more about in the coming months is our capital campaign. The campaign’s goal is to raise $1.2 million dollars for the building and its operation. This may seem like a lot, but in addition to building a structure, we need help furnishing the clinic with equipment, as well as establishing an endowment to help pay for the facility on an ongoing basis. If you interested in helping us with our campaign, continue to watch as we track our progress on our website and of course, I would love to hear from you as well.

Guest Blogger M.G.

Meet Dakota

A clear and brisk spring night is often a wonderful time to hear the great horned owl calling to its mate. At WINC our lead education animal ambassador is just such a regal specimen of a raptor.

Dakota came to us 10 years ago from another rehabilitator after it was determined he was imprinted. Poor Dakota had been blown out of his nest during a windy spring day and was picked up by someone who wanted to keep him as a pet. Aside from the fact that this is breaking a federal law, the person did not know how to care for Dakota and before long he became very sick. Once he finally made it to a rehabber, Dakota made a full recovery and has spent the last nine years teaching the public, school children, various organizations and countless scouts to admire our wild neighbors from a distance and not to pick up or interfere.

Should you find an injured or orphaned animal please give us a call so that someone can assist you on how to proceed with rescue and care.

Guest Blogger -LK

Reader Update: The little female badger we took in is no longer alone! After re-hydrating the little girl we contacted another rehabilitator north of here who has much more experience and proper housing for large animals like badgers, coyotes and foxes. Jeannie was delighted to take the orphan in and lucky for both of them a little male was transferred to her a short while later! At last report both members of the new family are doing well. Thanks for caring!

Thank you for helping us celebrate 16 years of caring

Mealworms and waxworms
$8,458.55
Medications
$3,494.97
Food and Formula (beyond what is generously donated)
$11,198.77
Electricity
$6,729.20
Releasing an animal back to its natural habitat

Priceless

For everything else there’s Wildlife In Need

Last Friday, Arbor Day, we celebrated the “priceless-ness” of wildlife with over 200 of our closest members, volunteers and supporters. This event is our biggest annual fundraiser and this group was one of the largest we’ve had in many years!

Despite the economy, our 16th Annual Banquet and Auction was a bigger success than we could have hoped for and we can’t begin to express our gratitude to each and every individual, business, member, volunteer and supporter who helped make that happen. We received donations from over 85 local (and not so local) businesses in addition to both monetary and auction items donated from over 60 individuals.

In case you missed the touching video put together by a friend of WINC please feel free to view it below.

And thanks again for caring.