Countdown to the 'Mad Season'

Well, the baby bird and mammal season is looming once again and before very long our Hospital will be brimming with tiny mouths calling out to be fed every few minutes. We have all been enjoying the quiet (ish!) winter months but we are now gearing up for the intake of the majority of our annual patient total which come in between April and August.

We could see fox or badger cubs any time now with baby birds starting to hatch towards the end of next month.

One plea before the madness starts: Please, please if you think you have found an abandoned wildlife baby, ring your nearest wildlife centre for advice before picking it up. More often than not it will not have been abandoned but the parent will not come back to it while you are anywhere near. Many baby birds will spend several days on the ground when they first leave the nest, before they start to fly properly, deer fawns will be left sometimes for many hours while mum goes off to forage for food. They should not be touched.

A majority of the baby birds brought in to us have been caught by cats. Please try to keep cats in if you know there are baby birds around, but if your cat does manage to catch one, please take it to a rescue centre as soon as possible as it is vital that the bird receives antibiotics within a few hours for it to stand any chance of survival.

Please call us for advice if you have any concerns at all about wildlife, we will be happy to take your call and will give the best advice we can.

No updates for a couple of weeks

This will be the last post for a couple of weeks but I will be back then to update everyone on what has been going on at Vale.

Things will start to get busier in a few weeks and I am hoping to be able to update the site at least a couple of times a week.

Please carry our number with you when you are out and about (01386 882288) - you never know when you will need us, even just to ask our advice.

Don't forget to spread the word about our 25th Anniversary Open Day on Sunday 7th June!!

And make sure you find us on Facebook and join the growing membership on there.

Back in a couple of weeks.

2009 so far...

We have now taken in over 70 casualties this year, which is a considerable number for the winter months, which is our quietest time of the year.

We have treated several foxes, mostly as a result of road accidents. We have also dealt with a few deer, again after collisions with cars.

A sparrowhawk was brought in after colliding with a window, suffering from concussion. After treatment and a couple of days recuperation, she was released back where she was found.

More underweight hedgehogs have been brought in and these are now tucking into regular supplies of cat and dog food, putting on weight, and will be released when the weather improves.

We are also busy organising our 25th Anniversary Open Day, to be held on Sunday 07 June 2009. It's hard to believe that it was so many years ago that I took in that very first tawny owl, the beginnings of Vale Wildlife.

Please tell all your friends about the Open Day and help us to make it a day to remember!

If you haven't already joined us on our Facebook page, please support us today and join by clicking on the following link:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=38936858194

Busy start & worrying future....

We have already dealt with quite a few mammals and birds in 2009 so it looks like being a busy year, particularly if we get the good summer (at last) which is being forecast.

Vale's name also seems to be reaching further afield as we are getting an ever-increasing number of calls from people all over the country as well as from vets and other rescue centres and wildlife hospitals seeking advice.

We have had quite a big mention in writer Hugh Warwick's new book 'A Prickly Affair, My Life With Hedgehogs' and have already received calls for advice from people who have read about us in it.

We are always happy to help whenever we can.

My biggest worry at the present time is the credit crunch. Although the takings in our local charity shop are up by about 20% as people are tending to buy more second-hand clothes and other goods, financial donations made to Vale have gone down quite considerably and if the current trend continues it will not take very long for us to start struggling. Although we are grateful to everyone who continues to support us financially, including the anonymous donor who has now sent us 3 donations totalling £720 (thank-you, whoever you are!!), we need all of you to remember our wildlife through these difficult times.

Casualty No. 1 of 2009

The very first casualty of 2009 was a fox, brought in by the RSPCA after it was found tangled in netting.

Wildlife often gets itself into trouble around netting of all kinds, garden netting, football and tennis nets, netting covering ponds, they all make good traps for unsuspecting animals going about their business.

It is a good idea to try to make sure nets are kept away from where they can cause problems - games nets should be taken down or tied up out of the way when not in use and other types should be regularly checked to make sure nothing is trapped in them.

This fox was lucky and lives to see at least a bit more of this New Year. He was carefully untangled from the net at the Hospital and as there were no injuries, he was taken straight back to where he came from and released back into the wild.

Happy Christmas to all our supporters

I would like to wish all our supporters and readers a very Happy Christmas, and I hope that 2009 will be a prosperous year for you all and for Vale Wildlife.

Thank you to everyone who has helped us to continue our work for almost 25 years - without public support we would not be here today.

A huge than you also to the staff and all our volunteers who have worked tirelessly over the past year looking after all the casualties that have come through our doors, raising vital funds to keep us going, helping in our charity shop and spreading the word about our work.

Have a great time and please help us to make 2009, our 25th anniversary year, the most successful yet.

Sad muntjac story

Today we had a very young muntjac deer brought in, we estimate only about 3 weeks old. He had been caught by a dog. He had probably been left, hidden away by his mum while she went off to feed. Unfortunately the dog discovered him and he sustained a bite to his side causing some ribs to be fractured.

Deer of any age are very difficult to deal with as they are so susceptible to stress when in close contact with people. This little one was in deep shock when he arrived and obviously had breathing problems due to his injuries.

He was given pain relief and steroids and was put in a heated, oxygenated incubator in a quiet room. Sadly he died a couple of hours later.

We still have lots of underweight hedgehogs coming in and we are looking after over 100, despite the fact that some people have been taking them to look after until they reach the important 600 gram mark needed to survive the winter.

We hope you all have a great Christmas - please spare a thought for our staff who will be working throughout the Christmas and New Year period in the Hospital, caring for the 170 casualties in our care at the moment, plus any others that arrive over this time.

The end of a difficult year.

As we come to the end of 2008, with a hospital full of hedgehogs, we can reflect on what has been a difficult and challenging year for Vale Wildlife in several ways.

Our biggest challenge, and the one which causes us most concern is the current financial crisis facing all of us. Obviously, the global credit crunch is having a massive affect on all charities but I do believe that the smaller charities are going to suffer more than many of the larger ones.

In the scheme of things we are a tiny charity and we live on the edge financially all the time so when times are harder for our supporters, the very people who keep the hospital going from day to day, we understandably receive less in the way of donations.

With only about 4 months running costs in the bank at any one time, things will go downhill very fast without continued public support.

Please remember sick and injured wildlife this Christmas and help Vale Wildlife to get through these difficult times.

In June 2009 we hope to be celebrating our 25th Anniversary - it would be very sad if we were unable to reach this important milestone.

Almost the end of another year already!!

This year has flown past, it will soon be 2009 and we are still busy here at Vale.

Our total patient intake to date is well up on last year, and although it is a lot quieter than it was in the spring and summer, we are still taking in more injured wildlife than usual.

The animal which we are seeing more than any other at the moment is, yes, you've guessed it....the hedgehog.

As usual in the autumn the youngsters from the second litters of hoglets are desperately trying to feed themselves up so as to gain a big enough fat reserve to survive the cold weather. Half-grown hogs are turning up in peoples gardens during the day on a regular basis on their quest for food.

Being normally nocturnal, the advice is that if a hedgehog is out in the daytime there is usually a problem. That problem might just be the need for extra food, but the youngsters are also prone to various infections which will need antibiotics to clear up.

If you do find a small hedgehog out in the day, seek advice from us or from your nearest wildlife rescue centre (weigh the little chap before ringing as this information is vital in order to give the correct advice). It is best to put it in a box whilst you are seeking advice otherwise he/she will invariably have disappeared by the time you go back to find it!!

Two recent 'patients':

1) A little grebe, or dabchick (pictured) came in with no obvious injuries. He was with us for a few days before being released back into the wild.

2) A swan was brought in, supposedly with nothing wrong with it, just needed releasing so we were told. We were immediately concerned because it had a swelling in the upper part of it's throat. Alarm bells....fishing hook......we x-rayed and found that our suspicions were correct. The hook and line (pictured) were removed through a small incision in the swans neck. A couple of sutures and an antibiotic injection later and the swan was recovering under an infra-red heat light. He will be going for release in a few days!! Another success story.

Update at last!!!

By mid-September we normally expect to be much quieter on the patient front here at Vale. This year is not going to plan as we are still busy & I haven’t had the time I would like to spend updating my blog, which is why I haven’t written on it for ages.

I have been busy, not only with the animals, but also getting our latest Newsletter out, & organising our wildlife course which is due to start at the beginning of October.
We have finished preparing our temporary lecture room (it is so frustrating that we were granted planning permission for our fantastic Education & Training Centre 18 months ago but we are still no nearer to raising the £400,000 needed to actually build it).

At the time of writing this we still have places available for the first course which will run for 3 consecutive Sundays, starting on 05 October. Anyone interested please email me at caroline@vwr.org.uk for a booking form & itinerary.

We are rearing a large number of baby hedgehogs at the moment, in fact our Brooder Room is filled with these & baby grey squirrels, but this is what we expect every year in September & October. Hedgehogs often have a litter of young in the late summer/early autumn & these babies struggle to reach a suitable weight to survive the winter. Without adequate fat reserves they will die in the colder weather which is the reason that young hedgehogs are often seen out & about during the day (hedgehogs are nocturnal & so it usually indicates a problem if they are out in daylight hours), desperately searching for the food needed to build them up for the winter.
Sometimes it is a case of just feeding them up until they reach around 600gms when they can then be released back out into the wild, but often they need a course of antibiotics or they need worming as hedgehogs are so prone to various infections & also to internal parasites.

Most of the grey squirrels we rear at this time of year will remain with us over the winter as they won’t have a stored food supply to keep them going. They will be released next spring.