#GivingTuesday started the year‑end giving season and we are off to an amazing start! Thank you everyone who has partnered with World Vets to help animals in need. Your gift is already at work making a difference!
We are grateful to have such compassionate supporters on #GivingTuesday and everyday. Thank you!!
Didn’t get the chance to donate on #GivingTuesday, but still want to contribute to our mission? It’s never too late to make a contribution to World Vets! Donations up to $6500 are matched dollar for dollar until January 31st, 2021!
Are you interested in learning more about marine mammals and how to get involved with local marine mammal stranding response? Join us for a free educational webinar and volunteer training. Open to residents of Vashon-Maury Island.
The Zoom webinar will take place from 6:00-7:30pm on October 27, 2020 and will be presented by World Vets veterinarians Dr. Stephanie Norman and Dr. Cathy King.
World Vets disaster response team has been working hard providing veterinary relief for animals impacted by the Cold Springs and Pearl Hill fires in the Omak, Washington area. We currently have veterinarians providing mobile response to address the needs of primarily horses and cattle that have been impacted by the fires. There are numerous animals with varying degrees of burns, many of which are severe. Other animals have wounds (wire cuts etc) resulting from fleeing the fire. There have been limited small animals cases presented so far. We have set up a dedicated veterinary response hotline (509-842-3440) that is available to the local community to call in requests for assistance. The additional current scope of our work includes :
-Clinical assessments and treatments of any and all animals affected by the fires;
-General assistance with recovery efforts (husbandry, fence building, feeding) assisting and working within the disaster response under the “Okanogan County Fairgrounds Cold Springs Fire Relief”
-Identifying specific supply needs and procuring resources needed to assist local animal populations for short term and long term needs (hay, feed, fencing materials, veterinary medications, etc)
-Providing herd health assessments and evaluations for livestock
-Updating disaster management officials on daily response summary and scope of work
Special thanks to the Okanogan County Fairgrounds for providing facilities for our team.
Below are some photos of the devastation and animals that have been impacted and are being helped. (Warning some photos are graphic)
Click here to donate to our disaster relief drive
We are grateful for the support of the many individual donors and supporters who help make this work possible. We also greatly appreciate supporting contributions from a variety of companies and organizations including Lakefield Veterinary Group, Uptown Animal Hospital, AmerisourceBergen, Patterson Veterinary Supply, Zoetis and People for Animal Care and Kindness.
World Vet is responding to animals impacted by the wildfires in Okanogan County and surrounding areas in Washington that have been ravaged by wildfires. This area is home to thousands of cattle and horses, many of which are now displaced and facing serious threats of feed shortages and starvation, especially as the winter months arrive. World Vets, working in cooperation with the Snohomish County Cattlemen’s Association, has created this fund specifically to provide hay and feed to animals impacted by the fires.
Thank you to all who have donated through World Vets specifically for hay and feed. The hay fundraiser through World Vets has now ended and we are working on coordinating deliveries.
The Snohomish County Cattlemen’s Association has set up a GoFundMe for ongoing donations directly through their organization.
World Vets is an international veterinary aid organization with headquarters based in Gig Harbor, WA. To learn more about World Vets work helping animals in Washington State and around the world, please visit our website www.worldvets.org
The West Coast is on fire and World Vets is responding. We have received an official request to respond to assist animals in the fires in Omak and Okanogan County Washington. There are numerous burned animals that need immediate assistance, primarily livestock, horses and wildlife. We need your help to support this effort. Our veterinarians are providing care for injured and burned animals, providing equipment and supplies and will also be working with local authorities to make assessments for short term and long term recovery efforts.
Washington fires. (photo Tristan Forsch/KATU-TV, AP)
How you can help:
Cash donations are most helpful so we can directly purchase supplies. We will be putting in an order for fencing material in Omak that can be delivered right away and will also be taking a stock trailer full of supplies. We will also be providing hay and other feed. Additionally, we will be placing an order with our veterinary distributor to purchase items like antibiotics, burn creams, vet wrap, bandage materials, pain medications, etc. We need funds for fencing, veterinary supplies, feed, and transport costs for our vet team.
Drop Off Supplies for Donation: If you live in Western Washington and want to donate fencing materials directly (stock panels, T-posts, electric fence, insulators, etc) and can deliver them to the Okanogan County Fairgrounds, please reach out to us for specifics.
Volunteer: We have our core team of disaster responder veterinarians, however, we may have a need for additional large animal or wildlife veterinarians. If you are a large animal, mixed animal or wildlife veterinarian licensed in Washington state, have previously volunteered with World Vets and are interested in volunteering, please send us an email at . We may call upon those additional veterinarians depending on needs.
World Vets has set up an emergency fund to respond to this horrific situation. We will provide updates as we get more reports from the field. Click on the link below to donate specifically to our disaster response program.
Please consider making an emergency donation to support this effort.
World Vets is a registered 501c(3) Non Government Organization. All donations are tax deductible. Tax ID # 20-4637447
The global pandemic has brought new challenges and obstacles to the animals and communities we help and also to the way we run our programs. Fortunately, we are very adaptable to change and our work has continue full force in new ways. Our volunteer veterinary teams traveling from North America are currently on hold until its safe to travel again and we are working closely with our in-country partners to carry out our programs and deliver aid that helping animals that need it most. Social distancing, mask wearing and extra safety precautions are the new standard of care on these programs, making it possible to get help where it is needed. Economic hardships brought upon by the pandemic make it even more important to continue our work, especially in developing regions. These are just a few of the many animals that tare receiving care through community outreach clinics, surgery clinics and mobile field clinics that we are supporting.
On August 18th World Vets released a rehabilitated harbor seal pup back to his natural environment of the Puget Sound after two months of rehabilitation. In June the seal pup was abandoned by its mother and was too young to survive on his own. Human interaction was involved in this pup being abandoned in a busy marina. After several days of observation in hopes of the mom returning, it was determined that the pup was on his own and was unlikely to survive without intervention.
The initial report came in to Cascadia Research Collective who monitored and then picked up the pup which was then transported to World Vets Marine Mammal Urgent Care Center. World Vets provided initial treatments and stabilization services before transporting the pup to a rehab center in the San Juan Islands. After spending two months at Wolf Hollow Rehabilitation Center, the pup was heathy enough to be returned to the wild. World Vets transported the seal and it released it at seal haul out near where he had been originally picked up.
This harbor seal pup has a second chance at life thanks to our supporters who make this work possible and the collaborative efforts of NOAA’s West Coast Marine Mammal Stranding Network, of which World Vets is proud to be a member. World Vets provides around the clock on-call services for the West Coast Marine Mammal Stranding Network to respond to sick, injured and stranded marine mammals throughout the state. Our marine mammal urgent care center has been busy throughout the season helping pups like this one.
Please remember to stay back 100 yards from marine mammals. If you see an injured, sick or stranded marine mammal, please do not approach it. Report strandings to the West Coast Marine Mammal Stranding Hotline at 1-866-767-6114.
Seal pup season is in full swing in Washington. This past weekend World Vets cared for this harbor seal pup that was brought to us by Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife (WDFW). This abandoned pup, too young to survive on its own, was picked up by WDFW on the Washington coast after being harassed by beachgoers. Before being picked up, it was monitored for >48 hours by WDFW volunteers and unfortunately it was determined that the mom was not returning.
World Vets provided emergency treatment and stabilization for the pup at our marine mammal urgent care clinic in Gig Harbor, Washington working under a permit issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service. World Vets then transferred her to Wolf Hollow Wildlife Rehabilitation Center for rehab where she will remain until she is old enough to survive on her own and can be released back to her home waters. Big thanks to our supporters who help make this important work possible.
World Vets marine mammal work is authorized under a permit with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).
If you see a dead, injured or stranded marine mammal, please call and report it to the NOAA West Coast Marine Mammal Stranding Hotline at 1-866-767-6114.
Given the rapidly changing events with the COVID-19 situation, all World Vets projects scheduled to start in March are now cancelled. In the last 24 hours the situation has changed dramatically and in the interest of public and personal safety March trips are being cancelled. The status of projects scheduled beyond the month of March are unknown at this time. Additional information will be sent out to volunteers registered to attend upcoming projects.
UPDATE: Since the original posting, additional trips have either been postponed or cancelled. The status of projects scheduled beyond the months of April/May are unknown at this time. Volunteers can expect to receive further communications periodically in relation to the project they are set to attend.
For weeks, World Vets Disaster Response team, working in partnership with Sydney Animal Hospitals Northern Beaches, has been responding to the Australia wildfires. Our efforts have included intensive field response, in- clinic treatment of injured and burned animals, providing veterinary supplies to teams in the field as well as clinics and rescue organizations receiving and caring for patients, providing funding for rehab facilities, deploying veterinarians on search and rescue missions and partnering with numerous veterinarians, rescue groups and government agencies to provide care and resources benefiting countless animals including native wildlife, livestock, horses and companion animals. This work was made possible by our generous donors who have supported this effort. We thank you!
As the fires start to die down, our efforts shift toward longer term recovery and support. The impacts of the the fire will be long-lasting and many animals will require ongoing care before they can be returned to the wild. Over 12 million acres of land has been destroyed and the urgent and immediate issues will soon evolve into long-term effects that could dramatically change the animals’ future habitat and health, especially for wildlife. When rains start to wash the charred landscape debris into the streams, rivers and oceans, marine animals may also become unlikely victims to be impacted by the fires as coastal ecosystems are damaged and biodiversity is threatened.
To support ongoing recovery efforts, Vetericyn is matching all donations to World Vets up to $20,000 until February 15th. To donate, click here:
