Residents, experts work to save injured deer in Richmond Hill backyard
Eye-opening experience for residents dealing with wildlife emergency

YorkRegion.com
June 1, 2016
Kim Zarzour

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 employees from the Newmarket-based SPCA with a deer cage borrowed from Procyon Wildlife Rescue Service in Beeton, an out-of-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 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 experience was a first — and an eye opener — for Kelly and his wife (so disturbed by the animal’s distress that she had to flee the scene).

Unfortunately, the drama ends sadly. The deer did not make it through the night.

He had broken his ribs, Stockman said, and one of them likely punctured a lung.

“When we were sewing him up, we noticed signs of lung damage, but we thought it was worth giving it a try. He just never came fully out of the anesthetic.”

Such fence injuries are not unusual, she said.

“If you’re building a new fence, you might want to choose one that doesn’t have spikes. It’s nicer for the animals, so they don’t have spears over the top.”

While he was glad to have been able to pull together a team to help the animal, Kelly is crestfallen the deer did not pull through.

Stockman, too, was disappointed, but sees a silver lining.

“It was a bit of a rigmarole and it’s too bad it didn’t have a better outcome,” but at least, she adds, a group of committed people were able to pull together as a team and help alleviate the deer’s pain during those last moments of life.

“It is true what they say. It does take a village.”

SIDEBAR

GOT WILDLIFE CONCERNS?

York Regional Police will answer a call for wild animal help – for now. But that comes to an end Sept. 1.

After that date, YRP will only respond if there is an immediate risk to public safety, or if an animal is severely injured as a result of a collision with a motor vehicle.

The new policy was outlined in a letter to municipalities earlier this spring, saying wildlife management is “an inefficient use of police resources …and may give rise to officer and public safety concerns”.

Starting in September, “it will be up to each municipality to have services in place to handle animal calls from residents” said Const. Andy Pattenden.

The City of Vaughan announced today it has a plan to tackle the issue. The committee of the whole has recommended enhanced wildlife services through an in-house solution including 24/7 response time and a wildlife intake and holding area in the current animal shelter. If approved by council later this month, the service begins Sept. 1.

In other areas of York Region, residents can check with their local municipality or contact Shades of Hope Refuge, at 705-437-4654.

For more on how to handle wildlife issues, visit shadesofhope.ca