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Enjoy these blog posts from staff, volunteers & board members at Snowdon Wildlife Sanctuary!
More posts coming soon!
Bird Brain
Before coming to Snowdon, I had yet to have the pleasure of working with ambassador raptors. Early in my tenure, the Board of Directors tasked me with the seemingly impossible job of retraining Merlin, the great horned owl. Our 14-year-old education bird had grown fond of his enclosure after an extended event hiatus during the sad times. Though Merlin was a challenge to win over (the topic of our first website blog), it only took about a month for us to start touring Valley County on a 30-presentation-long circuit. I continue to work with Merlin almost daily, and he has proven to be a very tolerant and stoic education bird once again.
There is a steep and challenging learning curve to animal training. The key to working with any animal, or person for that matter, is patience and consistency. I had the pleasure of building on these skills with a local falconer, Isaac Pottenger, while training a non-releasable fledgling red-tailed hawk we received over the summer. This 3-month-old youngster flew into a truck near Council soon after leaving the nest. The altercation left him with two compound fractures in his right wing, which usually results in the need for euthanasia. Instead of immediately putting this bird down, the Board and I agreed to see if he had a curious and food-motivated disposition. Though life in captivity is a challenging transition for most adult wild animals, juveniles can often adapt to this new set of stimuli. Isaac told me the number one way to earn a bird’s trust was exposure, so I moved some pillows and my laptop into the loft of our raptor enclosure. A week after doing all my computer work in my new nook, I could feed this wild fledge by hand.
Kwaali, The Born-Again Squirrel
Sometimes animals just know best. Such was the case with a tree squirrel that had been hit by a car. Jeff and I were volunteering at Snowdon one day when we received a scratchy cell phone call from a guy who had scooped up an injured, unconscious squirrel and wrapped him in a towel. At least that’s what I thought he said. Cell phone coverage at Snowdon can be fleeting at times. Then the caller said he was speedily on his way to the sanctuary as we spoke, so it was lucky that Jeff and I happened to be on site to assess this squirrel. In my mind, a squirrel vs. a car does not usually end well for the squirrel. When Brent drove up, this was the scene: All the vehicle windows were open; there was a large panting black dog in the back seat; and there was a lively squirrel running back and forth across the top of the bench seat. Apparently, the squirrel came back to life during the drive! I couldn’t believe that the squirrel didn’t jump out the open windows or, for that matter, into the dog’s gaping mouth. This was when I began to chuckle.
When Jeff and I tried to capture the squirrel to assess its injuries, it demonstrated amazing skills at eluding capture inside the car. It ran over Brent, onto the steering wheel, across Brent’s arms, and back to the seat top. At one point, the little squirrel jumped straight onto the big dog’s head and clamped all four squirrel toes onto his doggie scalp, like a toupee! At Brent’s command, Elroy the dog froze, and the little squirrel ran down Elroy’s back to the other end of the vehicle.
It Takes a Village
My name is Macy, and I’m Snowdon’s one and only 2022 fall intern. While earning my undergraduate degree, I spent 8+ hours every other week volunteering to care for wolves and wolf dogs at a sanctuary near Fort Collins. After graduating with my B.S. in wildlife biology from Colorado State University, I accepted a position with USGS surveying Boreal toads in Rocky Mountain National Park. Though I enjoyed backpacking for a living and studying this unique endangered species, I wanted my next job to offer me more animal handling experience. When I found Snowdon’s post on Conservation Job Board, I wrote my cover letter and kept my fingers crossed. Thankfully, Sierra was impressed with my application, and our interview went great! I packed up my SUV to move outside of Colorado for the first time in my life, giddy with the prospect of rescuing wild animals. As my time at Snowdon is quickly coming to a close, I can confidently add animal handling, raptor training, primary veterinary care, and content creation to my resume. However, this internship has taught me so much beyond syringe feeding and wrapping broken wings.
I arrived the first week of September to a frenzy of baby animals, weaned and restless, ready for release. Within two weeks of my arrival, the sanctuary buzz reduced to a quiet hum in the absence of skunks, foxes, a raccoon, a Swainson’s hawk, and a fawn. Despite our much lighter animal care load, we somehow got busier. With our open house event rapidly approaching, we hurried to make the property visitor ready.
Raising little stinkers
One afternoon, while we were syringe feeding our six baby squirrels for the fifth time that day, Allison answered the work phone. Sure enough, a young couple found three baby skunks meandering on the side of the road near Riggins. We assumed that they were orphaned because they were out during the day, were too young to be alone for any amount of time, and the couple found an adult skunk carcass on the road very nearby. These are all things that people need to consider before removing a wild animal from any situation. The last thing we want to do is kidnap babies that still have parents. We appreciate that these people assessed the situation and called us before taking action. Though not every animal that appears to be in distress needs our help, these three were almost certainly orphaned by a vehicle strike. Alex and I covered the rest of the bottle feedings that day so that Allison could drive three hours round trip to pick up our newest intakes.
While Allison was gone, Alex and I managed to look a few things up about how to raise baby skunks. According to one of my rehab textbooks, skunks, like most other omnivores, are bottle-fed with a puppy formula called “Esbilac” until weaned around ten weeks old. A preliminary google search also taught us that skunks weigh approximately 30 g at birth, apparently love to eat strawberries, and start to spray at three weeks old. So, we felt prepared to meet the little stinkers when Allison rolled up in Kelly (our trusty steed).
Little Yoga bear
It was in the fall of 2017 when we received a particularly distressing call from Jake – Jake had a bear cub in his house. It was snowing and a bitter cold November day, and we wondered how this man ended up with a bear cub in his house. The cub would be 9 months old at this point and surely far too big and feisty for someone to have in a house, so…. Hmmmm…. Jake said that he found the cub lying in the road near his house. He instinctively just scooped it up in a blanket and rushed it home. The cub didn’t put up any sort of fight. Over the phone, Jake said that the cub was small and appeared injured and, in fact, that its head was “oozing.” Jeff immediately contacted the Idaho Fish & Game Regional Manager to coordinate with her regarding this rescue need.
We soon arrived at Jake’s house in a particularly blinding snow swirl. Several friendly border collies appeared out of nowhere to greet us. They seemed to multiply out of the snow dust! But it was all tail wags and some puppy love, so all was good. Then Jake appeared and escorted us into the house. What I saw next was heartbreaking.
Indy & I
My name is Allison and I am the second intern here at Snowdon Wildlife Sanctuary. I’ve always loved working with animals but quickly found that I wanted my focus to be on wildlife. The ecological, genetic, and physiological differences in species fascinate me and I’m always spouting out biological facts to anyone that will listen. Because of this, I originally pursued a career in wildlife veterinary science and started my undergraduate at Montana State University majoring in animal science and organismal biology. As I got closer to graduation, the amount of schooling and money required in this field made wildlife veterinary medicine an increasingly less appealing career choice. I began frantically searching for other wildlife fields that might interest me. Veterinary clinics, agricultural studies, and conservation work, all had their pros and cons, but none of them felt right. This summer, I decided to look into wildlife rehabilitation. Snowdon Wildlife Sanctuary was at the top of the list with relative proximity to home and an expansive range of species treated, cared for, and released.
A Mother Knows Best
My name is Alex and I’m one of two interns working at Snowdon Wildlife Sanctuary this summer. I’m an incoming college senior from Michigan and this is the first time I have ever handled wildlife, lived off the grid, or even ventured west of the Rockies. My dad and I made the nearly 30-hour drive to Idaho so I could participate in this eye-opening experience. Growing up, I have always had a deep passion for animals. Initially, I planned to go to vet school, but after learning more about the realities of student debt, I was left searching for another path in the animal care field. I have always been fascinated with wildlife, so when I saw the job posting for this internship it became my goal for my last summer as a college student. Previously, I’ve had the opportunity to work at the local animal shelter and with my school’s equestrian team. Those two jobs did not prepare me for what I was about to get myself into at Snowdon.
A Love letter to Merlin
In case you haven’t run into me at a coffee shop or brewery in McCall yet, my name is Sierra and I’m the new facility manager at Snowdon. Previous to this job, I was a condor biologist based near the Grand Canyon. It took five years of moving every six months from internship to wildlife technician job to gain enough experience that I could convince The Peregrine Fund to offer me that permanent position. I loved every minute of chasing condors through the desert, but I knew after a year and a half, it was time for me to continue with my career and find an opportunity that would provide me with a fresh set of challenges. Coming into this experience, I wasn’t sure what to expect from such a daunting managerial position. As the only full-time, year-round employee at the organization, you have to be prepared for long hours, constant phone calls, crazy animal rescues, and a surprising amount of computer work.