Wildlife Haven Rehabilitation Centre

So, I went to the Wildlife Haven Rehabilitation Centre on Monday to photograph the animals! These photos here plus many more will be used for fundraising purposes. The proceeds will go directly to the animals in need there. You can view more photos by visiting my fanpage on Facebook here:
http://www.facebook.com/HeatherBaysPhotography

They have recently changed locations to a temporary place in Ile Des Chenes because of flooding. This place is really in need of some donations, so if you have some cash hanging around that you want to donate to a place that needs it, send it to them, they would really appreciate it! They always get so many baby raccoons every year, over capacity.

But they aren't the only ones who are in need of more space. The whole facility could use more of everything! And if you have some extra time on your hands? Why not volunteer?!

Here is there website for information on donations and volunteering!
http://www.wildlifehaven.ca/
After I was done photographing all the adorable animals, there was a call from a lady saying that some baby ducks and their mother had fallen in a manhole. So Reesa (one of the volunteer workers) and myself headed over to Waverly to try and help. When we got there we felt like we entered a hopeless situation! There was a mother duck with 10 babies (one of them on it's side struggling until finally it took it's last breath) floating on the water about 9ft down a manhole that was about 4 feet in diameter.

There was a ladder going down to them, but there were bars that didn't have enough space for either of us to fit through, (though a small child could easily fit through them).
So we called the City of Winnipeg to see if we could get someone down to open the bars but the lady was rather unkind and very unhelpful! She told us that someone could be down in 2 days!!! Well, that wasn't good enough, they would die in 2 days! So we realized a friend of ours (Lisa) lived in the area and we called her to see if she had a net. She didn't answer. So, we drove to Superstore and just about bought 2 lacrosse nets when Lisa called back. She said she would see if she had a fishing net and she would meet us by the ducks. So we bought duct tape in case we needed to make the handle longer. When we got back there, some city workers had shown up! Alas, they were unable to open the bars for us. Lisa showed up right after us with a hockey stick and some mosquito netting that she had just quickly sewn like a net, so we duct taped the netting onto the hockey stick and then taped a pole to the end of the hockey stick which was thankfully long enough to reach the ducks!

So it was time to save the 9 living ducks and their Mum! Sometimes one was scooped out and sometimes a few at a time! Mum didn't put up a fight at all, she seemed relieved and thankful!


The babies were placed in a box as they were saved so we could drive them to a pond away from this manhole. I am happy to say that the Mum and her 9 remaining babies were all rescued after being stuck for almost 5 hours! We released them into a pond in Whyte Ridge where another mother duck and her young came and greeted them. It was too sweet and a perfect way to end the day!