Category: wildlife rehabilitation

After a Long Swim, Great Egret Regains the Sky

Posted on by Monte Merrick

White Heron by John Ciardi
What lifts the heron leaning on the air
I praise without a name. A crouch, a flare,
a long stroke through the cumulus of trees,
a shaped thought at the sky — then gone. O rare!
Saint Francis, being happiest on his knees,
would have cried Father! Cry anything you please

But praise. By any name or none. But praise
the white original burst that lights
the heron on his two soft kissing kites.
When saints praise heaven lit by doves and rays,
I sit by pond scums till the air recites
It’s heron back. And doubt all else. But praise.

The person who called was standing at the Eureka waterfront, near the Adorni Center, when she watched a Great Egret come swimming across the channel that separates the shoreline there from Woodley Island. The ordinarily elegant and beautiful white bird clambored out of the water up onto the riprap and hunkered down, apparently exhausted.

Catching the Egret wasn’t that hard. A bedraggled big white bird sitting on rocks is easy to spot, and their exhaustion left them unable to flee when approached. Once captured, it was obvious that this was a juvenile Egret, – this year’s model, who’d probably come into this world just two islands over on Tuluwat, which hosts a large heronry each Spring and Summer.

After getting them back to the clinic, we first provided a warm environment to help with hypothermia, and administered warmed fluids both to help warm the egret as well as to begin rehydrating the seriously depleted bird.

Within a few hours the bird was standing and very pleased to discover the fish that we’d put in their housing with them. For piscivores in trouble, fish is a big part of the solution.

For many patients, a small sample of blood can reveal a lot about their condition. Spinning the sample in a centrifuge separates the blood into cells and plasma, revealing the percentage that is red blood cells. This number is often called the “packed cell volume” or PCV. Red blood cells carry the oxygen that is part of the fuel of life – the lower the PCV, the more anemic the patient. While there is some variation across the many species we treat, for aquatic birds, a PCV of 40 (that is to say that red blood cells make up 40% of the total sample) is considered a baseline of good health. This Egret’s first sample on admission revealed a critically low PCV of 17%. Considering the severity of the bird’s dehydration, it’s safe to say that the actual percentage of red blood cells would be even lower one the patient is rehydrated.

Still, this number didn’t really change the care we offered (warmth, fluids, fish and safety), but it did let us know how close to death the young Egret had come.

After a few days, of hydration and food, the Egret’s PCV had climbed above 20 and they were able to make short evasive flights in the aviary when we would capture for regular exams and weight checks. After 8 days in care the PCV had recovered another 10 points and stood at 30%. After a couple weeks, the Egret was flying beautifully – their PCV was back within normal limits, their weight had increased from 679 grams in admission to 1117 grams – a 160% gain! They looked really good. It was time for release.

Clearly this Egret is thinking, “Outside the box!”
“Two soft kissing kites”, indeed!
Watching an Egret fly from our care out over the mudflats of lowtide on Humboldt Bay is one of the greatest thrills.
A moment to pause and consider this restored freedom!
With a vigorous shake, the Egret dumps the last of humanity that’d been clinging to their feathers. A shiver and we are a memory.
The telephoto lens reveals where the Egret flew.
An adult Great Egret flies in to see what’s going on.
A meeting in Manila, “the gem of Arcata Bay“
The two Egrets on promenade.
And so we leave them to their private, wild freedom.

Even though many of our patients are injured traumatically, or have become so sick and debilitated that there isn’t anythng we can do to help, and even through the frustrations of living in a human society that casually hinders, harms and destroys wild lives, providing care for the wild, the innocent, provides a wonderful close view of the miracle of healing, the mystery of hunger, and the fulfillment of dreams. This Egret was an astonishing patient. Your support bought the fish, the fluids, the safe space, the net and the gasoline for the rescue, as well as paid for the trained and dedicated staff needed to deliver it all in an effective manner. Thank you for making sure this Great Egret had somewhere and someone who could help them with a second chance.

This is a crucial time in our history, and as we prepare to move our facility to a location that will give us something more stable and sustainable we need your help badly! If you can, please DONATE today

Thank you for making the difference all of our patients need.

all photos: Laura Corsiglia/BAX

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Barn Owls displaced, first by hay, then by fire, fly free at last!

Posted on by Monte Merrick

Six nestling Barn Owls (Tyto Alba) were admitted to Humboldt Wildlife Care Center mid-July, nestlings who’d been unintentional stowaways on a truckload of hay from Siskiyou county and delivered to Myrtletown.

We’ve posted a story about their care (check out A Half Dozen Barn Owls in a Truckload of Hay). This is the story of their release.

We’d been planning a trip deep into Siskiyou to return these owls to where they were from. In preparation the owls had each shown they could identify, capture and eat prey (a necessary step when rehabilitating orphaned hunters). They were each expert at flight, in excellent condition, and more than anything else, the aviary was clearly the biggest problem they had. It was time for freedom.

As anyone within five hours of Humboldt Bay probably knows, Siskiyou, Eastern Humboldt, and Trinity counties have been suffering from wild fires since early Summer. Unfortunately for these owls, the place on Earth where they came into the word is under a fire threat.

So we found a location that incorporated some of the characteristics of home, and hoped for the best, in a world that is becoming a patchwork, with all of us leaping from slippery rock to rock, trying to keep it going as we cross this torrent.

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A Summer Full of Wild Babies and an Urgent Need!

Posted on by Monte Merrick
A Coyote pup found near Tule Lake in the middle if a routine exam during her care at HWCC

What a Summer, what a year, what an era!!!! As of today, the 21st of August, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center has treated a thousand wild patients in 2022. Our humane solutions work has kept scores of wild families together. Among the thousand patients, our small facility in Bayside ( right now we only have a quarter-acre!) has provided care for 7 Barn Owl babies, 2 Coyote pups (one from Tule Lake, the other from Round Valley) dozens of Barn Swallows, Cliff Swallows, Violet-green Swallows, House finches, White-crowned Sparrows, and Band-tailed Pigeons. Many Mallards, Raccoon babies and a Ring-tailed cat we’ve had in care sicne she was an infant are still in care today, but soon to be released.

Now, as our caseload lightens up a little (we’re down to 50 patients from 100 two weeks ago currently in treatment) and we’re finally able to breathe a little, we have to focus on the biggest challenge we’ve ever faced – moving our hospital to a new location without interrupting the care we must provide our wild neighbors… I’m certain we’ll make it, but to be completely honest the stress of making sure we do is constant, and tiring. Already understaffed and overworked, it will require a huge amount of community support for us to make this happen. We need you badly right now.

I’ll be asking for contributions nonstop until we’ve made this transition – I hope you understand why!

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A clutch of five House Finches, who we cared for from the time they were featherless hatchlings, in our aviary being fed. Soon they were completely self-feeding and wanted nothing to do with us. All five were successfully raised and released in July!
Feeding these young House Finches is a sweet privilege in a day of long exhausting hours.
A very young Ring-tailed Cat, a cousin of the Raccoon, was brought to us in early July. She is doing very well and will be released soon back to freedom in her home range.
We’ve admitted several Gray Fox kits this year. Four have already been released and one is due to be free very soon!
A young fawn in bad shape: Northern California hasa lot of deer but very few fawn rehabilitators. This young Mule Deer came from Siskiyou county for care because we were closest.
Five Mule Deer fawns currently in care. Soon they will be weaned and ready for release. We have a very hands off approach when it comes to fawns – they need all of their wits to make it in the rugged Coastal Range – their wildness is the greatest asset and we work hard to respect and protect it. This photo take through a special hidden observation opening but there is no sneaking up on these guys!
A Western Gray Squirrel, admitted as an infant at the end of April was in care for a month before he was old enough to be released. Staff rehabilitator and BAX board member Nora Chatmon feeds him a milk replacer in the weeks before he was weaned.
One of our awesome Summer interns, Julia Bautista, administers a special vitamin/mineral supplement to a young Barn Swallow.
This Rubber Boa, a locally common if rarely seen snake, was caught by a cat in Southern Humboldt. After a week of antibiotics, the snake was ready for relase. Outdoor, free roaming cats cause a lot of pain and suffering to our wild neighbors.

As our Summer begins to wind down, and the effort to move looms in the near future, we are in a serious situation. We need your support now.

Every day someone tells us how much they appreciate that we are here. I understand that completely. I appreciate that we are here too! If we weren’t there would be nowhere for wild neighbors to be treated and released – no place to end the suffering of those too wounded to ever be free again, and no place to peacefully resolve human wildlife conflicts in a manner that all parties are satisfied and wild families are kept intact. The service that any wildlife hospital provides its community is pretty far below the radar, but when the need becomes apparent, when someone finds a wild neighbor injured or orphaned by the ordinary everyday operations of our human-built world, it is critical that a facility be there to provide the necessary care. HWCC has been operating in Humboldt County since 1979. I intend that it be here, providing ever better care for innocent wild animals far into the future, far beyond my own lifespan. Your support is the only thing that will make sure that we continue to be here for our wild neighbors now and forever and right now, we need you badly. Please help.

all photos Laura Corsiglia/bax

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A Half-Dozen Barn Owls in a Truckload of Hay

Posted on by Monte Merrick

It’s not the first time this has happened – a trailer-load of hay from Ashland or Yreka or somewhere else hours away from Humboldt Wildlife Care Center is delivered to a local ranch, only to discover nestling Barn Owls (Tyto alba) hidden with the bales. It’s happened a few times over the decade, in fact. So it wasn’t shocking when that call came in the middle of July – a load of hay just delivered in Eureka that had come down from Siskiyou County brought along the babies of a Barn Owl nest too. We admitted six nestlings that day, dehydrated, hungry and very unhappy.

As nestlings go, these six were pretty far along in their development. Three of them fledged within the first week of care and were moved to an outdoor aviary. Within two weeks, all six owls were flying. Each day each owl was getting at least one “medium” sized rat. (that’s a lot of rats – more on how we pay for it all later).

RIght now, we are helping them prepare for release by learning to hunt. The lessons tend to come pretty easily for them. You could say that they’re naturals. As soon as they demonstrate that they can support themselves, we know the time for their return the Wild is at hand.

Fledgling Barn Owl getting a routine examination while in care at HWCC.
Clinic staff administer fluid therapy on a dehydrated Barn owl nestling.
A young owl’s wing with new feathers that have not yet flown.
They sure fly now, and soon in total freedom.

These six Barn Owls are getting a second chance at wild freedom. They came so close to being among the many untallied victims of a human world that kills randomly and without recognition simply by operating as it was inended – We grow the hay, we store it, we ship it – none of it meant to harm owls, and none of it meant to prevent harm either. It’s in this world that we meet our mission. And we can only do it with your help. We’ve already spent over a thousand dollars on food for these beautiful and innocent wild lives. That’s only example of the real difference your support makes. Your support pays for the heating pads, the fluids, the aviary, the phone and the dedicated and skilled staff it takes to make the whole thing fly. Thank you!!

REMINDER! This is our last year at our curent location. YOur help is needed making this challenging move. Read more about it here and again, your support will help us a lot. It’s getting urgent!

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Moving HWCC: Next Level Unlocked! Property Found!

Posted on by Monte Merrick

Since we realized that we needed to relocate Humboldt Wildlife Care Center from its current location in Bayside to somewhere suitable and sustainable back in March of 2021, with less than two years to accomplish to the move, there has been a background of stress about our future that has added a layer of urgency to each day of operation – the clock is ticking!

After months of searching and considering multiple scenarios, at last, we’ve settled on a property that is available and accessible and meets most of the criteria we’d established. While the asking price is much more than we have, it’s also the most affordable we’ve been able to find. We’ve come to an agreement with the property owner for the lot, which, happily is nearly 6 times larger than our current leased quarter-acre. With this major step achieved, now we enter the next big challenge: secure the funds!

Sneak peek of future site of HWCC, once we secure the funding!

We don’t have much time now. We need to be on our new site and operating by the first of the new year, as well as have cleared our old site from our soon-to-be-former landlord’s land. This is a very tall order. We will not be successful without the help from our community, especially financially. Still, that we’ve even found a piece of property that we can use is very relieving – it hadn’t been looking too good for too many months!

The new location is in Manila, which has many advantages for our work. I think we will be well-placed to continue and expand our reach in our region. As the Crow flies, we’re just moving across the bay.

Another view of this future diamond in the current rough!

What a year it’s been! As the director of the Care Center, I don’t think we’ve faced a more challenging time – between my health problems (which thankfully are no problem at all now!), the ongoing pandemic, the record number of patients we’ve admitted over the last two years and the challenges of of this relocation, we are in a swirl of difficulties! Yet guiding us, as always, we have our mission – to serve our region’s wild neighbors in need, to serve the field of widlife rehabilitation with workshops, to educate new rehabilitators, and to help our communities develop the resources and perspectives needed to peacefully co-exist with the Wild, and end our society’s war on Nature. Our mission makes our challenges seem quite manageable indeed! And with your support, which has kept has going for over 40 years, Humboldt Wildlife Care Center will move into a new era of stability and growth.

If we had $500,000 dollars, we could purchase the property and fund the costs of rebuilding of our facility. That’s a lot to raise in such a short period. Realistically, we need to plan on having less resources available – we’ll need to creative and committed. Fortunately, we are well versed in accomplishing a lot with very little. I don’t know how we will do it, but I do know that we will.

Thank you for being here always. You’ve made quality care for our wild neighbors possible. If you’d like to support our work, our land purchase, or the costs of rebuilding, and invest in the continued care available for our wild neighbors, please DONATE! Every gift helps.


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Want to help us help our wild neighbors in need?

Posted on by Monte Merrick

You can help return an orphaned or injured wild animal to the wild! You can help keep wild families together! You can help keep our facility functional and clean! Volunteers are needed for all tasks. After putting our volunteer program on hold in March of 2020, we’ve been slowly rebuilding it, adding volunteers to our shifts as the pandemic has allowed, and now we are ready to add more.

Volunteers are a crucial element in the field of wildlife rehabilitation. All wildlife rehab facilitities operate on shoestring budgets and without the necessary help from volunteers, we’d never last. The pandemic has been brutal on staff and we are very happy to rebuild our core team of volunteers.

The life of a volunteer: One day you’re helping with an opossum, the next day a Bald Eagle.

Some of the tasks that volunteers help with:

1. Cleaning: First and foremost, from the newest, most inexperienced volunteer to the director of our facility, a major task for all of us is cleaning. Laundry, dishes, sweeping, mopping, sanitizing – these are mission critical in a hospital setting and your experience in your own life will serve here! If you’re new to this kind of maintenance, we can help you and you dont have to get a job in the food service industry to learn it (as many of us did, like me!). We also have to clean the patient housing, which means that you will be trained in how to work around a frightened wild animal, without making the stress much worse.

2. Feeding: Patient food must be prepared at least twice a day. Want to learn what it takes to emulate a diet that a wild diet in the setting of temporary captive care? It’s a great skill to have and it won’t be long before you’lll understand the intricacies, and the principles that support them, of feeding a wild animal a nutritional diet that is familiar and therefore stress reductive.

3. Examinations: Helping staff perform routine examinations of our patients. In order to perform an assessment of the condition of our patients, routine exams are given. Volunteers learn valuable handling skills that protect the caregiver and the patient from harm. Instructions, safety protocols, and personal protective equipment are provided as needed.

4. Transportation: If you can drive from Oregon to Laytonville and sometimes beyond, then you can help us with transportation for patients. The region we serve is huge and we have to travel as many 3 hours away to pick up orphaned and injured wild neighbors. Simply driving all day can be a very big help to an animal who desperately needs a second chance.

5. Rescue: Many times people report an animal in trouble, but they are unable to do anything about it. They call us. We go out on missions to rescue wild animals every day. Even as a new volunteer you can still participate simply by driving. Capturing wild animals in need is a skill, but you will be provided with the training and the safety equipment to be a hero!

6. Releases: Returning an animal to their birthright of wild freedom is a joy beyond compare. Transporting animals to their release site and helping to ensure their safe return to the life that they were born to is one of the regular bits of supreme awesome-osity that can be yours simply by being here helping!

7. Answering the phone: Helping people resolve conflicts with wild animals is an important part of our daily work. Keeping wild families together – in other words preventing wild babies from becoming orphans is a serious task, can be difficult, and largely happens on the phone in conversation with someone who may be at their wit’s end. Learn to advocate for wild animals in an effective manner by answering the phone in our clinic. It can be challenging, but that just makes our successes sweeter!

8. Humane Solutions! Sometimes keeping wild families together requires an intervention. In order to stop a trapper or some other cruel plan to get rid of an unwated wild animal, we go to the scene and work with the people to keep the wild family safe while conving them that it would be ebst if they moved on. This is delicate work that can also take us on an adventure through people’s crawlspaces and attics. Not for everyone, but if it’s for you, you’ll learn valuable skills in humanely solving people’s conflicts with a wild animal.

9. Ambassador: You can be a voice for the rights of Mother Earth and the Wild. Education and outreach are very important parts of our mission. Do you enjoy speaking in public? Do you have a passion for environmental education? Do you want to make people act right toward wildlife? We may be the droids you’re looking for!

Releasing an animal who was going to die without our care is one the greatest joys known to humanity.

These are some of the most common and important ways that we rely on volunteers to meet the challenges of our mission. Just about every wildlife rehabilitator working today began as a volunteer, and many still are volunteers. Many wildlife rehabilitators with their own facilities at their own houses are still volunteers! This is not a well-paid field, unless you factor in the job satisfaction, and in that sense, it’s unparalleled.

But satisfaction isn’t all that you’ll get out of helping us help our wild neighbors. You will get critical training that can be used here or in a larger context. As a member of the Oiled Wildlife Care Network HWCC/bax is your local path toward being qualified to help care for impacted wildlife if there is ever a catastrophic oil spill locally or across the state. Believe me, the only way to make these kinds of disasters less painful is being able to help repair and restore what was broken. Your desire to help begins here!

So if you want to help us help wildlife in a direct hands-on manner, let us know! CLICK HERE TO APPLY

And if your dance card or your plate is already full, you can always help us meet our mission with your generous support. Donations make our world go ’round. Without your financial help, our doors would close forever. PLEASE DONATE HERE

Thank you for your love of the Wild. Love is the most important ingredient in the conservation and protection of our natural home and our wild kin!




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Humboldt Wildlife Care Center Now Has A Dedicated Rescue Rig!

Posted on by Monte Merrick

One day last year our staff went out on a call about a sick deer. The people who called watched as we put the carrier with the deer into a small hatchback and they hatched a plan of their own. This Spring, when they purchased a new vehicle, they called to see if we could use their old car, a 1996 Volvo Wagon! They were very kind and wanted to be sure we could use the vehicle. We sure can!

The region we serve, Northern Menocino to Oregon, the Pacific Ocean to I-5, is over 20,000 square miles! (nearly twice the size of New Jersey, the state I was born in!) We put on a lot of miles and a reliable rig that is also safe is something we’ve wanted to add to our resources for years. And now we have one!

Now if you see a plain tan Volvo on the road, you never know, we just might be transporting a wild neighbor, who knows, a Northern Alligator Lizard or a Bald Eagle!

Or we might just be on our way to the North Coast Co-op, again, for more supplies for our ever increasing Spring and Summer caseload.

So to Fredyne and Gerald, who so generously passed their ride into our service, thank you!

And you know, not every donation is a car… without many small donations, we wouldnt be able to put gas in the car, or food in our patients’ bellies. If you can, please donate here. Thank you!!

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Great Horned Owl Spends the Night Stuck in a Wet Garbage Can, Released After Care.

Posted on by Monte Merrick

Not just an indignity! For a warm-blooded body the size of a Great Horned Owl (Bubo virginianus) to spend the night stuck in can with inches of water on the bottom is life-threatening! Fortunately the landowners found the owl in the morning and got the soggy, angry, owl to our facility in Bayside.

Minor abrasions afflicted the undersides of both of their wings and all over, their feathers were soaked and very ruffled. The owl was also fairly dehydrated. Warmth and fluids helped both problems immensely and soon the owl was much less soggy, but no less angry.

After spending some time in our large aviary, making sure that flight and agility were unimpaired, we took the handsome bird back to McKinleyville and the area where no doubt there are eggs or owlets glad to have both parents back on the case!

After leaving the box, the Great Horned Owl wasted no time putting distance between themself and us.

It’s our community’s support that keeps our doors open, our freezer full of rats, and an aviary suitable for a bird as large and magnificent as a Great Horned Owl. Thank you for making our work possible. If you want to help please donate!

video and photos: Laura Corsiglia/bax

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North Coast Co-Op Seeds for Change Roundup for HWCC all of March!

Posted on by Monte Merrick

Our month for the wonderful community support program of the North Coast Co-op has arrived! It’s a fantastic and simple thing, the Seeds For Change program of the Co-op. Each month an area non-profit, chosen by co-op members, is the beneficiary of customers rounding up their purchases at the checkout. It’s so easy and makes such a difference! And boy do we need it! Besides our ever increasing caseload of wild patients (last year we treated 1,612 of our wild neighbors!) and the coming of our busy wild baby season, but this is the year we have to find our new location and move there. We are extremely grateful for this opportunity provided by the membership and leadership of the North Coast Co-op! So please, this month, when you shop the co-op, remember us when you checkout and be sure to ask to round up your purchase to support our region’s injured and orphaned wild animals!

And thank you to everyone who supports our work! Without you we wouldnt be here at all!

Want to donate now? click here!

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