Austin Wildlife Rescue takes in 160 animals, many babies after storm
AUSTIN (KXAN) — Clean up is still underway after Wednesday's severe weather, but at Austin Wildlife Rescue they aren't only dealing with storm damage.
"Not only did it impact everyone's homes in the area, but it also drastically impacted the wildlife," said Jules Maron, executive director of Austin Wildlife Rescue.
Austin Wildlife Rescue is a nonprofit organization that provides free medical help to animals that are brought in. But they do rely on donations to continue their work.
Maron said in one day they had more than 160 animal intakes and many of them were just babies.
"Our very first intake of the day was actually this tiny little mouse," Maron said. "A lot of baby birds were devastated by these storms."
A few of the animals KXAN spotted include baby skunks, baby raccoons, baby foxes, baby birds, a turtle, ringtails and a fawn.
"I think the storm scared a lot of the babies, they got separated from their mothers, so we are seeing a drastic increase in the number of fawns," Maron said.
David Grant said he spotted a baby raccoon outside his home and when it didn't leave he brought it to Austin Wild Life Rescue.
"I was really glad to see there was somewhere so close that was going to be able to take these animals in," Grant said.
Maron said she expects to see more animals over the next few days as people continue to clean up their properties.
If you see an animal that looks injured she said to give the the nonprofit a call, and they can walk you through the steps to take.
Maron said they are seeing a lot of animals with broken or fractured bones, from either falling out of trees or from limbs falling.
"On a regular basis we do about two orthopedic surgeries a week. We will be doing a lot more than that here over the next couple of weeks," Maron said.
Anyone interested in donating to the nonprofit's cause can click here.