Wildlife Foster Care Parent

  Purpose  

Every spring and summer, TWC receives hundreds of orphaned wild baby animals. Due to time and space limitations, TWC cannot take on the immense workload created by the combined needs of these babies.  To remedy this, TWC fosters out litters of baby wild animals to families that have the appropriate space and environmental conditions in their home and enough time to support the babies’ healthy development.

   How Volunteers Help

Orphaned wild baby animals cannot survive in nature without the care of their mother. Foster Parents provide orphaned baby animals with an opportunity to develop as normally as possible and give them a fighting chance at survival once released back into the wild.

Examples of Activities

1)    Locate and prepare a suitable space in your home for the orphaned babies

2)    Set up the babies’ cage in an appropriate manner and clean their cage when required

3)    Weigh babies up to once a day and calculate their formula consumption

4)    Prepare formula for babies and syringe feed them up to 4 times a day

5)    Monitor the babies’ development and report any issues to TWC

Qualifications/Requirements:

• 16 years of age or older (If under 18,  guardian consent be required)
• Strong comprehension of English
• A time schedule that permits the feeding of babies up to four times a day
• Safe, quiet and low stress space in your home to host the babies.  This location will ideally be isolated from the high traffic areas of the household and must not be accessible to other pets in the house. This space should also provide a window for natural light and an electric socket for a heating pad.
• The Foster Parent is required to provide a heating pad, a digital weighing scale, old blankets and some supplementary food sources

Training

Families begin the foster process by setting up a Home Assessment with the Volunteer Coordinator.  During this visit to your home, the Volunteer Coordinator will examine the room where you intend to host the babies and ensure there aren’t any outstanding safety issues that may exist in the space.  Once the Home Assessment has been completed, each Foster family will be required to attend 3 separate training sessions at Toronto Wildlife Centre.  Immediately following the third and final training session, foster volunteers will take their new family members home with them.

Timeframe

The Foster Care program begins in early March and extends all the way into November.  Foster Families do not have to be available throughout this entire time period but are required to fully commit to the time needed for their babies to become self sufficient.  This process can last anywhere from 3 to 8 weeks and will vary among differing species. 

Location

Your lovely home

  Benefits

·      Receive in depth training on the feeding and maintenance associated with a particular species of wild baby animal

·      Experience a one of a kind, hands on look at the development of baby wildlife

·      Provide the chance of survival to a litter of orphaned animals