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New education, outreach service launched in wake of Wild Bird Clinic closure
BY BARRY GUNN, OVC
Budget cuts have grounded the Wild Bird Clinic, but a new wildlife education and outreach service is poised to take flight. Wildlife Education and Environmental Programs (WEEP) will expand and redirect the focus of public education programs formerly provided by the clinic.
The shift was made necessary following the decision to shut the clinic effective Jan. 1. It was no longer possible to absorb the costs of treating, housing and rehabilitating injured wildlife at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital, says Prof. Dale Smith, Pathobiology.
“We haven't lost the expertise or the interest,” says Smith. “We simply no longer have the resources to subsidize medical care for animals that don't have owners.”
The Ontario Veterinary College is, however, still in the business of providing care for avian and exotic pets and training veterinarians interested in the specialty, she says. The teaching hospital continues to have a substantial avian and exotics caseload and positions for one intern and one D.V.Sc. student. DVM students will still be offered an optional avian/exotics rotation, albeit without diverse cases of wild birds coming into the clinic, she says.
From modest beginnings, the Wild Bird Clinic grew to handle hundreds of cases per year and relied heavily on volunteers for support, handling and upkeep of the animals. Donations helped defray some expenses but didn't come close to covering the hospital's costs, says Prof. Bruce Hunter, Pathobiology, who started the clinic in the early 1980s. Finally, in 2005, the decision was made to close the clinic as University-wide budget cuts forced all departments to make some tough choices, he says.
“We couldn't just remove it from the curriculum,” says Hunter. “We've changed the focus and restructured to adapt to shifting fiscal realities.”
People who find injured or sick wild birds are urged to take them to their local humane society. There are also wildlife rehabilitation centres that can help, such as the Toronto Wildlife Centre (416-631-0662 or www.torontowildlifecentre.com) and Earth Rangers (905-417-3447 or www.earthrangers.ca).
OVC's long-term goal is to work with wildlife rescue facilities in the area to provide students with clinical opportunities to treat and study wild birds, says Hunter.
Meanwhile, the clinic's outreach programs will be carried on and expanded through WEEP.
“One of the main purposes of the Wild Bird Clinic had always been public education,” he says. “We've done hundreds and hundreds of presentations in public schools and for community groups over the years.”
As a new non-profit entity, WEEP will have a broader focus on ecosystems, environment and the impact of humans on wildlife and wild spaces, says Nathalie Lemieux, the group's program co-ordinator and a teaching lab technician in the Department of Pathobiology. Plans call for further development of EYES (Environmental Youth Education Series), a web-based interface developed with the support of the Imperial Oil Foundation.
Lemieux trains and supervises the more than two dozen volunteers who take an active part in the educational programs and care for the resident birds — two hawks, a great horned owl, a turkey vulture and a peregrine falcon.
“We're not sending them out there to do ‘show and tell,'” says Lemieux. “They're carrying a very important message about the ecological and ethical issues arising from human impacts on entire ecosystems. It's not just about birds.”
For more information, visit www.wildbirdclinic.com.
