Rescuing and rehabilitating wildlife during the pandemic
Interview by Susan Barzallo
Blue Ridge Wildlife Center is a wildlife teaching hospital located in Boyce, Virginia. Its mission is to care for native wildlife by integrating veterinary medicine, rehabilitation, education, and research. It offers a hotline to the public providing advice to help sick, injured, or orphaned animals. The staff and volunteers work to care for
native wildlife, offering veterinary care and rehabilitation. The goal is to help the injured or orphaned animals get reintroduced into the wild.
The Center also collects and shares scientific data about local wildlife, diseases, environmental toxins, and other threats. It provides education for children and adults about the importance of protecting wildlife and its habitat. The Center’s educational programs reached about 5000 children and adults in 2019. Blue Ridge also provides internships for veterinary students.
All of this important work is done without any local, state, or federal funding. All funding comes from donors and annual events. Because of the COVID-19 crisis, raising money has been difficult.
The Animals Voice spoke with Jen Riley, DVM, Director of Veterinary Services at Blue Ridge Wildlife Center, about how they have managed during the pandemic.
Are you and your staff okay? Did you have anyone close to you get sick?
We acted early to take precautions and are fortunate not to have any COVID-19 cases in our staff/volunteers or anyone’s immediate family.
Has the COVID-19 crisis caused your monthly income to go down? Have you lost Patreon members, animal sponsors, donors, or other financial support that you used to count on?
We rely exclusively on private donations and much of this comes in through our annual fundraisers—primarily our annual gala event, our summer camp, and our WildFest event, but also through smaller education programs with our ambassador animals. With COVID-19, the public has not been allowed in our facility for educational programs and we have not been able to host our larger fundraising events. We have continued providing education through Facebook Live events and our quarterly newsletter, and are still getting some donations, but this does not make up for the loss of our larger events.
How has the pandemic
affected your ability to have events, activities, visitors,
or volunteers?
See above. In addition to fundraising and educational events, we have not been able to have visitors to the Center and when finder’s drop off sick or injured wildlife, they are not allowed in the building (all information is collected over the phone). This means that people are not coming into reception, seeing/buying our merchandise, and are less inclined to make donations with their animal drop off. That has been tough, but certainly keeping our staff safe is more important.
Beginning in early March, we stopped all volunteers from coming to the Center and divided our six person staff into two units that were not in contact or sharing any physical space: 1) the veterinarian, veterinary technician, and rehabilitation manager, and 2) the executive director, operations manager, and education manager. This was unfortunately during our busiest season (we average about 250 patients in care on any given day over the spring/summer) and we only had three individuals taking care of these inpatients and assessing new admissions. It was a very overwhelming spring. In the late spring/early summer, we began taking in a small number of our very experienced volunteers to assist, each committing to multiple days per week (normally they work one day per week) to minimize the number of individuals in the building.
We now have all volunteers back in some capacity (many helping with projects from home) with strict requirements regarding exposures/travel/etc., and daily temperature checks. Anyone with any signs of illness is asked not to come in or, if signs develop during the day, they are asked to leave. Masks are worn at all times and we social distance as well as possible while in the hospital. All of these things have greatly changed how we work, but we have created a new normal that is working for us.
With the pandemic affecting income and in person experiences, what were some of the creative ways you raised money and kept your supporters involved? For example, did you host virtual tours or online events?
We have started doing virtual education programs for the first time this year. We hosted an online auction to
offset some of the funds we will not be bringing in given the cancellation of our gala. Our annual wildlife rehabilitation education event was virtual for the first time ever this year.
We continue to produce our quarterly newsletter, The Ridgeline, for members. And we will be participating in Giving Tuesday again this year. We are doing everything in our power to keep people involved!
Were you forced to turn down any animals because you did not have enough money or help due to the virus?
We did not turn away animals due to the virus and its impacts on our staff or finances, but it was certainly a challenging year of long hours and tough financial choices.
What other impact has the pandemic had on running the center, if any?
We are up 20% in patients this year (we have already taken in over 2,700 patients, which is more than we took in during all of 2019). We suspect that this is because more people are home finding sick/injured animals. There have also been changes in regulation from the state. There are special precautions we must now take when treating certain species and sadly, bat rehabilitation has been temporarily suspended in our state (VA) due to concerns that we may be able to give this virus to the bats (there is no evidence of this so far).
We are now involved in a research project looking into COVID-19 in our North American bats which we hope will relieve concerns for those that regulate wildlife rehabilitation. In some ways, it has been positive in that we are exploring new outreach methods and reaching new people (via social media and virtual events). The virus has helped us update our emergency plans, cleaning protocols, and fundraising techniques!
Are things starting to normalize now that restrictions are lifting or are things still as bad?
Most of the restrictions we put in place were self-imposed. As a veterinary hospital (not just a rehabilitation center), we were considered essential, but we chose to keep our staff safe by not allowing the public inside. We are still choosing not to do indoor programs just yet, even for small groups. Though legal restrictions may have lifted, the safety of our very limited staff and volunteers must be prioritized.
Is there anything else you would like to add that I may have forgotten to ask you? Is there anything else you would like our readers to know?
Regardless of pandemics, wildlife rehabilitation (across the United States) is not state or federally funded. Medical care is expensive to provide, but we are
not allowed to charge for it.
Much of the work we do focuses on One Health, the idea that animal, human, and environmental health are interconnected and protecting one protects all. Pandemics, including COVID-19, are often of animal origin. We are constantly monitoring zoonotic disease and notifying public health officials when there are concerns.
Wildlife hospitals aren’t just here for wildlife, we’re here to protect human health. Please support your local rehabilitators!
For more information, or to support Blue Ridge Wildlife Center, visit:
Blue Ridge Wildlife Center
Blue Ridge Wildlife Center Facebook Page
Blue Ridge Wildlife Center on Twitter
Blue Ridge Wildilfe Center YouTube Channel
Susan Barzallo is News & Associate Editor for The Animals Voice.
