All in a day's walk

I took some pictures on my walk trying to find cell signal. It's a complete dead zone at the center so I had to walk about a quarter mile near that old barn and stand on the side of the road. I felt strange standing there as cars would pass...pretty soon the locals will probably grow accustomed to the odd girl always standing in the weeds. hehe.

Needless to say the best way to get a hold of me is by e-mail because the wireless Internet is flourishing here!! (unlike at my old college house)



Today was orientation. I got a tour of the place by Shona, the intern coordinator who is a super sweet gal from Scotland. Wolf Hollow is on 40 acres and it's gorgeous here. It feels like a vast open countryside, but then I remember I'm on a tiny island. They try and keep the habitat natural here for the animals sake so we were bushwhacking through tiny trails in tall grass to get from one animal enclosure to the next. The grass was so bad in one spot that Shona grabbed her scythe and started blazing a trail, looking like a cute grim reaper type (if that's possible). I was mostly following one of the rehabbers around to get a feel for the place, which was good because there's a lot to take in and they only explain things briefly. I'll be getting to do a lot of hands on care for the animals but primarily cleaning, feeding etc. until I get more experience. One thing I did get to do today was hand feed the baby birds. There were 2 tiny newborns in an incubator, 2 crows, 3 starlings, 5 robins, a black swift and a pigeon. I would take little bits of food in tweezers or on a stick and they would open up their huge mouths and guzzle it down. My favorite was the little humming bird that ate out of little syringes of formula. It doesn't quite know how to fly yet but was trying, so it was buzzing all around like a big awkward bumble bee. I went into the woods and cut down some browse (ocean spray), a tree/shrub with soft leaves and gave it to the fawns. They were really cute but we have to be very careful around them because they habituate (become accustomed to humans) very easily. I also followed Penny (one of the rehabbers) into the barn owl pen to feed them their mice. She was getting all up close in personal with them while I cowered in the back trying to not get hit or pooped on as they fluttered around. They are beautiful awesome creatures but I wasn't kidding about the pooping part >:0P

No pictures yet of what I get to do, but hopefully soon. Maybe on my days off I'll get a chance but things are too crazy right now. Plus I'm the only one here who has to do homework! Good ol' Cal Poly with their Senior Projects, they know how to keep us busy. It shouldn't be too bad, I have to write a paper, keep a log book, and then write another paper and present the final product when I get back. Mostly it's just doing the everyday stuff here, but it does take the fun out of it a bit.

I'm glad every one's enjoying the blog!
Love you all!!