Wildlife Rehabilitation
Many
years ago when our veterinary practice was just a few months old, a kind person
found an injured Red Tail hawk on the road and brought her to us for help. She
had a fractured wing that we were able to operate on and after months of
rehabilitation, the patient flew back into the wild! This positive, powerful
experience galvanized our entire staff to become involved during the infancy of a
group, that years later, became the New York State Licensed Wildlife
Rehabilitators Association. It is difficult to describe the feeling one gets
when a bird of prey looks into your eyes...it is as if he or she is looking into
your very soul.
In the early days, we were the only animal hospital that would treat injured or orphaned wildlife free of charge. We saw many different species of patients and our expertise grew with each difficult case. We expanded our knowledge to include Endangered Species and for years have treated 300- 500 individual wildlife patients per year.
The picture above right shows a few patients in our care. From upper left clockwise they are...grey phase screech owl, red tail hawk, snowy owl, great grey owl (rare), goose, and cooper's hawk. We removed the doors briefly for this posed photo.