The Story of the Fox Kits

In late March, a local farmer decided to take down an outbuilding on his farm with a skid loader. It was a small building and only took one good push to knock it down. As the dust settled, he noticed something that looked out of place. He heard something. He ventured closer...and saw five little fox kits in a small nest, just beneath where the outbuilding's floor boards had been. The skid loader wheels had passed right next to their den!

The kind farmer gathered up the kits and put them in the bed of his truck, then called us at Nebraska Wildlife Rehab for help. As a general rule when babies are found, we ask the public to put them back and leave for a while to give the mother a chance to return for her young. The presence of people generally spooks adult animals, and the mother of  most any species will hide and wait for a human to leave before approaching her young. Our farmer carefully replaced the kits, then piled soft dirt around the den so if the mother did return but not move the kits, he would at least see her tracks and know she was nearby. After a night and a day, the mother had still not returned, and the farmer called us back.

One of our veteran volunteers, Treasurer, and now Executive Director, Laura Stastny, drove two hours to take the kits into care. Upon a thorough inspection it was determined that our babies were five females, just a few weeks old, and just beginning to open their eyes.

 
Laura started them on bottles right away. They have done exceedingly well and are now eating formula and soft foods out of dishes.  

As growing red fox kits do, they are establishing a hierarchy amongst themselves by rough-housing, tumbling, and play-fighting. Once established, a "leader" kit in the wild would get to eat first (due to limited food supply) and push away her siblings. Since Laura is rearing them instead, there will always be plenty of food and so the kits will share.  



In two weeks, these babies will go into a large outdoor enclosure to begin "wilding them out"-- acclimating them to weather changes, allowing them to catch their own small live prey within the enclosure, and letting their natural wariness of humans to grow. Fear of humans is an essential key to any wild animal's survival; we don't want them wandering too near people or cars where they can be hurt or killed. 

The kits will stay in their enclosure to wild out until July, at which time we'll release them (with permission, of course) onto an appropriately-sized tract of land. Hopefully they will be able to make their own lives, and live a long time, after that point! 

If you'd like to see more videos of these little foxes, along with other animals we've taken into care, please visit and subscribe to the Nebraska Wildlife YouTube page.

And if you'd like to help support us in our efforts to save beautiful native wild creatures like these, please donate! Our 50 States for Great Plains Wildlife Fundraiser is running right now, and the animals benefit from every single dollar from generous people like you! 

NWRI's recent educational events

Nebraska Wildlife Rehab has been busy!

Over two weekends in February and March, we hosted three classes given by the International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council (IWRC). Many people came from within and without Nebraska to attend, with the farthest person coming all the way from Arkansas.

We hosted the Basic Wildlife Rehab (BWR) training for the third time, as well as two other advanced classes: Feeding and Nutrition, and Pain and Wound Management. This was the first time the advanced classes have ever been offered in Nebraska, and we were very proud to be able to accommodate IWRC. Attendance was brisk-- BRW boasted 22 students, Feeding and Nutrition had 16, and Pain and Wound had 19.

In March, one of our fantastic volunteers, Amy Campagna (educator, rehabilitator, and board member), met and talked with Girl Scout Troop 45111 at Maplewood United Methodist Church.

The scouts were studying about caring for animals, so Amy brought several of NWRI's current fosters and engaged the scouts in discussion. They were enthusiastic and attentive, asked many questions, and were thoroughly delighted with the animals and the whole presentation. Educating the public and especially young people is one of NWRI's main functions, a responsibility we take seriously and love to do, so this was a welcome opportunity. Not to mention, a real treat for Amy to spend quality time with some of the smartest students around.

   

The scouts bid a very generous goodbye to Amy and the animals with a much-appreciated car-load of donations! Troop 45111, thank you so much for hosting us!

 If you would like to schedule a NWRI speaker for your event or group, give us a call at 402-234-2473. You can find possible topics and other scheduling information on our website.


For the 2012/2013 school year, NWRI received a generous grant to work with Collective for Youth in offering environmental and wildlife education programs to students in four OPS middle schools, after school hours. Our volunteers Laura Stastny Amy Campagna, and Matt Cronin have been engaging with students at Marrs, Lewis and Clark, Monroe, and King Science Center for this six-week session on nocturnal animals, entitled Creatures of the Night. In the pictures below, you can see students at King Science dissecting pellets from that mysterious caller in the night, the owl.

Owl pellets are fun to dissect since they are comprised of all the indigestible parts of prey consumed by the owl-- beaks, bones, claws, fur. Pick enough pellets apart and you may be able to reconstruct an entire skeleton...every young scientist's dream.

These are exciting times for NWRI! So many educational opportunities, spring baby season, fundraisers....stay tuned!

February Wildlife Center Training!

As you already know, NWRI has a new Wildlife Center at Ash Grove in Louisville.  What you may not know is that NWRI is an all-volunteer organization.  That means that to make our center run, we need you! The success of our new center will depend on a dedicated family of volunteers to staff the building, accept and triage animals, and answer inquiries from the public.  Can you help us save Nebraska’s wildlife?

Please join us this month for classes in our new Wildlife Center!  We are offering Volunteer Orientation and Wildlife Center Volunteer Training throughout February for NWRI's new and experienced volunteers.  We also have the unique opportunity to host the International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council’s (IWRC) Basic Wildlife Skills Class this month.  This class is taught by IWRC experts and will be held for two days at the Fort Omaha campus of Metropolitan Community College.  This class comes to our area only once every 4 or 5 years and is fascinating, so don’t let this opportunity pass you by!

You can make a difference, so please read on — and join us! Further information on these events is available at the NWRI website. If you plan to attend any of these sessions, please RSVP to Laura at info@nebraskawildliferehab.org or 402-960-4366.

Volunteer/Center Orientation (1 hour):

February 8  6-7 PM

February 10 6-7 PM

February 12 2-3 PM

 

Wildlife Center Volunteer Training (8 hours)

February 15-16  5-9 PM both nights

February 19  9 AM to 5 PM (with lunch break)

February 21-22  5-9 PM both nights

 

All of the above are free and are being held at the new center in Louisville.

 

 

IWRC Basic Wildlife Skills Training (hosted by NWRI, given by the IWRC)

February 26th and 27th at the North Omaha Metro Campus

Cost $159 or $125 for an IWRC member


As always, thanks for all you do! We couldn't appreciate you more!

Volunteers needed!

Hello, wonderful people!

We are looking for as many volunteers as possible to help us clean our new center in Louisville this weekend.  If we can finish the cleaning this weekend, we can move on to painting and replacing carpet, and hopefully getting the furniture in, all before the new year!

Can you come help us this weekend?

We will be at the center in Louisville (just 10 minutes south of the Sapp Brothers exit in Omaha) at the following times:

Saturday, December 11th from 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM

Sunday, December 12th from 12:00 PM to 4:00 PM

Please let Laura know ASAP if you can help (nebraskawildlife@yahoo.com), and she will send you a confirmation e-mail with directions to the new center as well as the name of the person you should check in with when you get there.  

We can't make the new center a success without you, so please come and help! Snacks and beverages will be provided!

Thank you so much!

THE TIME IS NIGH

We have a new home!!

The generosity of Ash Grove in Louisville, NE has allowed NWRI our very own 4,500 square foot habitat. Our new Wildlife Operations and Education Center is located just 10 miles off the Sapp Brothers Exit on Highway 50.

You can read about our new center, and all of the exciting things happening in our new newsletter, which is now available online here.

NWRI is poised to grow immensely now that we have a center! We will be growing in all areas - animal care, education, school projects, university internships and conservation partnerships.  Now is the time to get involved in this amazing and rewarding organization!

First, we need your financial support to cover the costs of running a center.  To help us towards this goal, some generous donors have issued a challenge grant to you!  (Yes, you!)  They will match every donation, dollar for dollar, made to NWRI in the month of December, up to $10,000.  This is the perfect opportunity to make your gift to our wildlife go even farther! Please donate through our PayPal link on the NWRI website.

(You can also set-up recurring donations from a credit or debit card to make your gift last year-round!  If you’d like to do this, just e-mail us at nebraskawildlife@yahoo.com and we’d be happy to send one to help you fulfill your gift!)

Second, we need your time! Over the next several weeks, we are going to be cleaning, painting and moving into the new building. Our first cleaning sessions will be Tuesday, December 6th and Wednesday, December 7th, from 4-8 PM both days. If you’re interested in coming and lending a hand, please us know at nebraskawildlife@yahoo.com or call Laura at 960-4366 so we know to expect you. Then, please watch the Events calendar on our Web site to find out when we’re going to be there, and what we’ll be doing. The more people who can help out, the faster we will be up and running in our new center! If you can clean, paint, vacuum, or move furniture, we need you!

Then, starting in January, we are going to start training volunteers to staff our hotline from the building. This will be a great job for anyone who wants to learn everything about our native wildlife, as well as NWRI as an organization. We would like volunteers who can commit to a 4-hour per week shift at the center in Louisville. It is intensely interesting and fulfilling work.

In February, we will start NWRI animal training for anyone who wants to rehabilitate wildlife. We need more animal rehabbers in almost every species, including squirrels, raccoons, rabbits, songbirds and waterfowl. This is an in-home volunteer opportunity, so volunteers do need to be able to care for wildlife in their homes.

Lastly, we need wildlife transporters to move wildlife from the Nebraska Humane Society to whomever will be caring for it. This is a one day per week commitment year-round, lasting maybe just 45 minutes to an hour in the winter, and up to three hours in the summer. It’s a fantastic job for someone who wants to learn a lot about wildlife, but can't care for animals in their home.

This is an incredibly exciting time to be involved with Nebraska Wildlife Rehab, and we hope you will join us in our new adventure as we expand to serve more of our homeland through our love for animals. It's been a long and winding road, and we know we are here because people like you care about the importance of wildlife. Thank you for all you do!

Please, make a donation to help Nebraska’s wildlife today! Remember – this holiday season your gift will go twice as far! If you donate in December, your donation will be doubled by a matching grant!

If you have any questions about donating or would like to volunteer, please let us know.


We, and the animals, appreciate your support!
 

OPPD to the Rescue!

On Sunday evening, NWRI received a call that there was a pigeon hanging from an "invisible line" above a pole on 55th and Leavenworth. We contacted the Nebraska Humane Society to see if they had dispatched to the call and they had, but there was nothing they could do because the bird was too high and beyond their reach.

 

So, unable to ignore an animal in distress, we went to the site at 8 p.m. that night to find that the pigeon was hanging by a wing from what was likely a fishing line. It was still alive and in desperate need of help. It was hanging halfway between the tree and the electrical pole, above the sidewalk, probably about 50' in the air!

The pigeon isn't in this picture, but he was a few feet above the top of this pole and a few feet to the right, hanging above the sidewalk about halfway between the tree and the pole.



We tried calling tree trimmers, Cox Cable, and the utilities -- anyone with machinery that could get that high in the air. Finally, Dave from OPPD answered our call for help! He arrived on the scene and was able to determine that the pigeon was hanging from fishing line that extended from the nearest tree all the way across Leavenworth Street, where it was attached to another pole! He extended his cherry picker to its highest limits and was able to cut the line and catch the pigeon as it swung towards him. He brought it down to us, safely on the ground.

Upon examination, we were shocked to see that although the fishing line was wrapped several times around the pigeon's wing, there are no broken bones or dislocations! His wing was swollen from lack of circulation and very sore, and he does have some feather damage. We cut all of the remaining line away, and gave him some medication to help with the swelling. He is now resting comfortably and will be released in just a few days!

 

 

 

 

 

We know that many people, even bird lovers, are not fond of pigeons, but this guy was in serious distress and we couldn't leave him there to suffer!

 

 

We are incredibly grateful to Dave from OPPD for helping save this guy!

Thank you, Dave!

Calling all Bobcats...

Hello to all our wildlife friends! As some of you may know, we have been working with the students of the Underwood Hills Focus School (3rd through 6th grade) to build an Outdoor Science Classroom at the school. This classroom has been designed by the students and includes bat, bird, and butterfly houses, a digital weather station, and a huge native prairie garden. This project has been partially funded by the Nebraska Environmental Trust, administered by the Nebraska Academy of Sciences.

The students have been working hard since last spring -- they have done extensive research, designed and built all of their houses and picked out their plants. While they were on fall break these past two weeks, the school district was supposed to clear the approximately 500 square feet garden plot of sod so the students could till, landscape and plant over the coming three weeks (seeds and bare root plants). However, the school district HAS NOT cleared the land and we are in desperate need of someone with a bobcat or other large machinery to come in and clear the sod for us ASAP. With the cooler weather upon us, it's really important that this garden go in soon! If you or anyone you know can help, please call Laura Stastny at 402-960-4366 as soon as you can! We all thank you for your help!

Also, if you are interested in joining students and parents to lay pavers and put in plants on a Monday or Wednesday afternoon in the next few weeks, please call Laura or email nebraskawildlife@yahoo.com. We'd love to have your help with this exciting and energizing project!

Finally, if you can't help out on the ground, but would like to donate to this cause, we'd still like to raise funds for some extras for the students, including field guides and references, binoculars to scope out the birds in their new houses, and even a Web cam for the bat house.

Donations can be made to NWRI by check at PO Box 24122, Omaha, NE 68124 (just write Focus School in the memo line) or by PayPal. You can find our PayPal link here.


We appreciate all of your help in making these students' hours of hard work and dedication an educational success!

Spring into Summer Update

It has been an exciting spring for all of us with Nebraska Wildlife Rehab, Inc. (NWRI)! We have received several charges that are unusual in rehab, including a baby beaver, a baby muskrat, 3 baby minks, and a beautiful Franklin’s gull. All of these aquatic creatures have really tested the limits of our caging resources (we don’t have that many pools!) but we are really enjoying their time with us, and are thrilled at how well they are growing and learning the skills they need for their release.
The big story for us right now is the extreme number of baby raccoons we have received and are trying to manage right now. After a very slow start to raccoons this spring, they have been flooding in! We have about 80 babies now with another month or so for juveniles to continue to be admitted for care, and we need your help! Please consider the following:

VOLUNTEER – Whether you are a seasoned veteran or a brand-new volunteer, we need help now! We have 14 babies in need of immediate placement, including the following:

- A litter of four that are nursing well off a bottle. They are working on weaning now, and will need about two to three weeks in care before moving outside.

- A single baby, far younger than our other babies, that needs to be fed four times a day. She needs about five weeks with a rehabilitator before she can be weaned.

- Three single babies, all eating formula out of a dish. They need to be weaned, and will require another two to three weeks in care before moving outside.

- Another litter of three babies, all eating formula out of a dish. They need to be weaned, and will require another two weeks in care before moving outside. These babies are not friendly and will need an experienced hand.
**Please note that to be a raccoon volunteer, you must be in a house (no apartments please!) and there cannot be any children under the age of 12 in your home.

If you’d like to help, please call Laura at 960-4366 or e-mail her at lastastny@yahoo.com. If you have never completed a volunteer application, you can find it online at:

http://www.nebraskawildliferehab.org/pdf/get_involved/volunteering/application.pdf


DONATE – Raccoons are the most expensive animal we rehabilitate on a regular basis. Each baby costs NWRI about $50 to raise, including formula, food and caging. Please consider donating today to sponsor one or more babies!

http://www.nebraskawildliferehab.org/how_you_can_help.html#donations


BUILD A CAGE – With all of the extra babies, we need more caging! Raccoons spend about eight weeks in an outdoor wilding cage once they are weaned. We need additional cages and release sites for them to accommodate all of our raccoons! A new cage costs about $200 to build, so you can help by donating to build a new cage, or by putting a cage on your property if you live in a rural area with good raccoon habitat!


If you have any questions about how you can help us with our raccoon explosion, please call or e-mail Laura at 960-4366 or lastastny@yahoo.com.


There are tons of other exciting developments happening at NWRI this spring, including a project with the Underwood Hills Focus School to build an Outdoor Science Classroom and wildlife habitat on school grounds, and a new home of our own! Watch your mail for our newsletter with more details in the coming weeks. If you’re not on our mailing list, you can make a donation to receive the newsletter or watch our Web site for the new newsletter, which will be posted there once it is sent!

That's the update. Thanks for all you do!

Volunteer Potluck

We will be having our annual Volunteer Potluck on Saturday, April 24th at 3 PM. Whether you've just started volunteering with us this year or have persevered with us through the seasons, all Nebraska Wildlife Rehab volunteers are welcome to attend.

Saturday, April 24, 2010 at 3 PM
Gifford Farm
700 Camp Gifford Road
Bellevue, Nebraska

This is a great opportunity to meet and get to know other volunteers, network, share tips and ideas, and just have a good time together. Please bring your favorite potluck dish to share!

Looking forward to seeing all of you!

Volunteer Orientation a Success

Thank you to everyone who came out to our Volunteer Orientation on Tuesday night! We are extremely pleased with the results. We filled three wildlife transporter spots and secured new, passionate volunteers with exciting talents in fundraising, cage-building and hosting, and animal caretaking. We were thrilled to meet you all-- 2010 is looking to be our best year yet!

NWRI on the news tonight!

KETV News (Channel 7) interviewed our own Laura Stastny this afternoon about our most recent coyote release at a private property in rural eastern Nebraska. This story should be on at either the 6 PM or 10 PM news (hopefully both!), and will be in the Omaha World Herald tomorrow. We hope you get a chance to tune in!