wish i could give all my moola to sarvey!

Disclaimer: If you don't like wild animals or are a fan of Sarah Palin, you probably won't like this post. Actually, you probably won't like me either. Just saying...

I haven't played in a long while, but this week Miss Kelsey my amazing IRL friend who does her thing over at The Seattle Smiths used *my* idea for Wishful Wednesday.. so even though I'm a day late and a dollar short, here goes:

 

"I Wish" I had never ending funds 
to donate to Sarvey Wildlife

Sarvey Wildlife is a wildlife rehabilitation center that takes in injured or orphaned wildlife - from starlings to black bears and everything in between - and cares for them in hopes of ultimately being able to release them back into the wild. It is a small non-profit run exclusively on donations and the hard work of volunteers.

All images from www.sarveywildlife.org

I first learned about Sarvey when I was around 10 years old. My family was in a park when a baby Grey-Horned Owl fell out of a tree. It was going to be attacked by dogs so since it clearly couldn't fly, my mom grabbed a towel and scooped it up. Shortly thereafter the mama owl swooped down and put her talons in my mom's back so needless to say we hurried to the car with the big fluffy basketball baby owl. After several phone calls we made our way 90 minutes north to bring the baby to Sarvey. It was spring time and they were so slammed when we got there, a lady begged us all to help with the babies. What did they have us doing, you ask? Oh, just bottle feeding and "pottying" baby raccoons... a never ending supply of baby raccoons. We later learned the baby owl was released several months later in the same park, and well.. that was the beginning.

When I was in highschool I did my senior project up there, working full time as a volunteer "intern" for a month. Sarvey is a very special kind of place where, in just a few hours, you may be cleaning crow shit from a cage one minute, and hiding food for a bobcat the next. One of my most memorable experiences there happened late one night when it was just Sarvey's founder the late Kaye Baxter and me in the clinic. She was hurriedly working to hydrate and remove bullet fragments from a gorgeous golden eagle that had been shot (who does that?) when a baby deer came in that had been hit by a car. It had a huge gash on its head. The golden eagle obviously took priority, but Kaye told me to fix up the deer... Say Whaa?? I didn't even know where to start! Kaye was very calm (or totally out of her rocker!) and told me it was just like sewing a hem. Well nevermind that I didn't (don't) know how to do that either... I gave it my best effort. It was probably the best sewing I've ever done :-) I don't think that baby deer lived, but in that moment I was so... alive! Anywhooo...

Nowadays I don't have much money, but I still make time to go up to Sarvey to volunteer. Last year my brother turned 13 and started bugging me to bring him. The age minimum is 14 but we fudged a little bit on the volunteer form and now brother and I go up pretty much every week!!! He keeps me company on the long drive and is becoming quite the little caretaker! I love spending time with him working up there, and we have had some amazing, some hilarious, and some not so funny experiences.

• Towel drying river otter pups... they are just like puppies, and you haven't lived until you have seen what otter pups do with a towel!!!
• Surprises when "pottying" baby raccoons. I will just say this: PROJECTILE.
• The time I held the hawk while Gabe tube fed it and somehow the food missed the hawk's throat and went directly into my eyeball.... Not fun.
• Chasing the escape artist squirrels all over the clinic.... It's a fun little game!
• Sneaking a peak at the "off limits" black bear cubs... they couldn't see us, so it was ok :-)
• Chopping up frozen rats... not pleasant!
• Bottle feeding wobbly baby deer... precious!

Gabe and a *fat* river otter pup after bathtime

Gabe's first time 'catching' a bald eagle for meds

So if I am MIA from blogging Wednesday evenings, it's because I'm probably being pooped on by a baby raccoon, sorting through frozen rats to feed the raptors, or maybe stitching up a deer's head!

Disclaimer: They are much more professional now than a decade ago, and they would never just be like.. go sew that deer. But truly, it happened!!

If you can't tell, I'm a major animal lover... and like I said I don't have much money, but I do donate (not my time but my beer fund) to a few other awesome charities as well:

Conservation International
World Wildlife Fund
National Resources Defense Council
American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

and my favorite...

Defenders of Wildlife
because Sarah Palin and her aerial wolf hunting can go to Hell makes me want to vomit.

The only downside of these $10 here $20 there donations? They put you on massive mailing lists and now I get junk mail from every NPO from here to Timbuktu... and address labels. I have a lot of address labels :-)