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Thursday, June 2, 2016
yorkregion.com
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Residents, experts work to save injured deer BY KIM ZARZOUR
COMMUNITY
kzarzour@yrmg.com
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PAGE 21
He was just out for a quiet morning coffee in his Richmond Hill backyard when Dan Kelly suddenly found himself in the midst of life-and-death drama. As the retiree meandered around his pool at 6 a.m. Friday, he noticed blood on his freshly washed deck. Suddenly the nearby flowering shrub began to rustle and out stumbled an injured deer, his intestines hanging from a gash in his belly. The creature cowered near the back fence as Kelly quickly sprung into action — and quickly discovered there is no easy answer for large animals in distress. Sensing the deer’s life was in danger, he picked up the phone. First, he tried calling a rehab centre in Beeton, then the Ministry of Natural Resources and finally, with no answers at the first two numbers, York Regional Police. Police suggested he call the local SPCA, but the agency admitted that they weren’t equipped for an animal of that size. “It felt like I’d entered the twilight zone; what do you do with a large injured animal?” Eventually, Kelly connected with veterinarian Dr. Sherri Cox of the National Wildlife Centre in Caledon and Cathy Stockman, manager with Shades of Hope Wildlife Refuge in Georgina, and they came up with a game plan. By noon, they were all in his backyard, along with two
Working together to save an injured deer discovered in a Richmond Hill backyard are Cathy Stockman (far left) tending the IV, Sherri Cox of the Wildlife Centre in Caledon (second from right), along with Newmarket SPCA representatives. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
employees from the Newmarket-based SPCA with a deer cage borrowed from Procyon Wildlife Rescue Service in Beeton, an outof-region representative from the Natural Resources Ministry and two neighbours, Bobby and Dana Revai. “We have very limited options,” Stockman explained. Shooting the animal with a tranquilizer was out of the question. “You can’t discharge a firearm in a built-up area. It needs to be in a safe place if the animal starts running. You don’t want him to go into traffic.” The deer, meanwhile, had curled
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up against the back fence. This was their chance. The wildlife experts snuck up behind him from the neighbours’ side and with a “jab pole”, injected him with an anesthetic. They carefully moved him to a safe spot in the yard and began surgery. For the next three hours, in intermittent rain, Dr. Cox and the ad hoc surgical team reinserted the animals intestines and sewed him back up again with three layers of stitches — Kelly and others holding umbrellas aloft to keep everyone dry — and nearly eight hours after the drama first began, the deer was
ready for his trip up to the Shades of Hope refuge in Pefferlaw. It would be days before Kelly learned the animal’s fate, days of wondering how the injury could have happened. His best guess is the deer sliced himself open as he leaped a neighbour’s fence, one with sharp spikes. The neighbourhood is close to the Mill Pond and there have been other signs of wildlife — coyotes, foxes and rabbits. Another resident in the heavily treed community had also noticed a deer in recent days. But this expeSee EYE OPENER, page 10.
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