Vision Statement

Piedmont Wildlife Center will strive for excellence in wilderness care and will return injured orphaned and sick wildlife to their native habitat as healthy animals. By carefully choosing the location of our Center we hope to encourage preservation of important corridors of wilderness to help insure healthy wildlife for our future. We will serve as a hub for knowledge distribution about wildlife and their rehabilitation with an emphasis on those species found in central North Carolina. Areas of particular interest for education include wildlife rehabilitation, wildlife diseases, wildlife habitat, the importance of wilderness, and how humans can live more harmoniously with wildlife. Student interns will leave with a greater understanding of wildlife biology, rehabilitation, and ecology.

Centers and rehabilitators from other parts of the state and country will be able to use our facility as a model and a resource for wildlife rehabilitation. A program will be in place so that veterinary interns will spend a year or two years at the Piedmont Wildlife Center to acquire training and knowledge sufficient for them to go on to head other centers or pursue residencies in Zoo or Wildlife Medicine.

The center is to be located within a short distance of many higher learning facilities including colleges, universities, technical schools, medical schools, a school of public health, a veterinary school, and a nationally respected zoological park. The Center’s records will be used to conduct research projects concerning wildlife diseases and to improve overall knowledge about wildlife rehabilitation and medicine. The Center will also serve as a surveillance node for emerging wildlife diseases. The Piedmont Wildlife Center will collaborate with the North Carolina Zoological Park, the North Carolina State University College of Veterinary Medicine, and other institutions of higher learning to publish information relative to wildlife diseases, medicine and rehabilitation.

There will be four phases of development for the center. The first phase will be to get started with the important task of rehabilitation. The rehabilitation facility will include a hospital, an isolation area, a nursery, and caging. The second phase will be to build an educational area. This will be a place to which the public can come, see non-releasable wildlife, learn about the importance of wilderness, and attend wildlife classes.

The third phase is to build a wilderness trail. This trail will lead through woods and piedmont wilderness calling attention to important habitat and wandering by non-releasable wildlife in suitable caging which will allow for viewing with minimal stress on the animals.
The fourth phase of development will be to build an intern’s residence. This will allow for year round living quarters for our veterinary interns and out of town college interns.

Overall statement:
The rapid development and change of landscapes in North America has fundamentally changed the conditions under which wildlife lives, reproduces, and evolves. The Piedmont Wildlife Center is devoted to addressing the challenges of working out ways for wildlife and contemporary human settlements to co-exist. We will do this through the provision of veterinary and rehabilitation services to endangered wildlife. We will serve as a research institution into the epidemiology of wildlife health problems. We will also provide outreach and training to the community, and others working on wildlife and rehabilitation issues.

• 1. Details of the need for such an institution
• Human wildlife interface increases constantly as human populations grow and wilderness becomes "developed". A center to help heal the damage caused from this interface is very important.
• Deleterious effects on wildlife – animals that have come up against this interface suffer either:
• directly from trauma (hit by vehicle, running into a window, human attack, dog or cat attack)
• Indirectly from environmental toxins, or habitat loss.
• These crises should be used as teaching tools to illustrate the peril wildlife, nature and ultimately each of us faces.
• The importance of a research/surveillance based Wildlife Center has grown with new concern about wildlife-borne diseases, and environmental degradation.
• Emerging diseases (e.g. West Nile virus, hantavirus, cervid wasting disease (the deer equivalent to mad cow disease)).
• Endemic diseases (rabies, baylisascaris, leptospirosis, giardia, salmonella are a few examples of wildlife diseases with public health implications).
• Environmental degradation Environmental degradation occurs as a result of development. The layout of our towns, roads, and businesses, as well as the use of chemicals such as industrial waste, pesticides, herbicides, and others all impact our wilderness, our wildlife and our futures. The impact of these problems can be measured by the intake of animals directly affected by these problems.
• Bioterrorism perceived as a palpable problem in the United States for the foreseeable future. President Bush has allocated billions of dollars for protection from bioterrorism. Several wildlife diseases such as West Nile Virus, anthrax, and foot and mouth disease could easily fit this category. The Piedmont Wildlife Center will serve as a surveillance post for such threats as they pertain to wildlife.
• Helping to preserve endangered and threatened species. Rehabilitation of common species has minimal impact on native populations, but rehabilitation of threatened and endangered species can have significant impact on native wild populations of these animals.
• Demand for these services has grown for two reasons:
• continued development of the landscape – more roads, more buildings, more problems
• greater awareness of wildlife and commitment to preserving wildlife on the part of the general population due in part to the work of the APS Wildlife Center from 1997 to 2002.
• The decision of the Animal Protection Society of Orange County to phase out their wildlife program. They no longer take in birds and have cut the position of director of wildlife. Last year people from the area brought about 2000 animals to the APS Wildlife Center. This year the APS has terminated the director of wildlife and stopped taking in birds, leaving a void in the area for the care of these animals.
• The need for a veterinary internship
• There are some 29 veterinary schools in the United States, but only a handful with any emphasis on wildlife medicine.
• It is difficult to find opportunities for wildlife medicine. There are only a few veterinary schools, a couple of wildlife centers, and zoos which offer advanced training in wildlife/zoo medicine.
• The increasing awareness and consciousness of habitat destruction and species extinction has created an interest in wildlife medicine.