A Haven for Injured Animals

Today we are visiting the North Island Wildlife Recovery centre... We honestly thought this was actually in the North Island area (like north of Campbell River), but no... it is near Parksville!

That is a beary toothy smiley... Can you see me??

This is a happening place!! With schoolbus loads of kids and lots of visitors!

And yes, bears feature pretty large here...

Which is as it should be... 

I feel really at home here and this guy...

Is my type of bear!!! Hullo fellow stuffie!

Majestic creatures, aren't they?

And the cougars aren't bad either...

They have a tonne of birds that, for one reason or another, were nursed back to health but can't be released into the wild. This is an albino raven who needs protection from the sun.

This is Casey, he was found as a baby on the ground, with no nest nearby. He had a severely dislocated wing and would never be able to fly... 

So now he lives here and is an educational consultant!

WE found a map and... OMG... there is a LOT to see here!!

They had webcams in the bear rehabilitation habitat...

There are several bears in there right now, getting ready to be released into the wild at some point.

They had lots of owls... This gray owl was hit by a car in the Interior and had irreparable wing damage, so he lives here...

The place is really set up to appeal to kids and there was this clump of boulders where you could go through... like in a cave system...

Mmmm... we saw some rats scurrying around earlier and... well...

... I'm going to pass on going through there... mice are one thing... rats are a completely other thing1

They had a wildlife garden...

With all kinds of cool, native plants.

And there was even a fairy garden!!

That's the Mad-hatter from Alice in Wonderland!

A lot to see...

Of course fairies can live in treehouses too!

And apparently some live in RVs too...

And have little campfires...

This was pretty cool!!