West Place was recently featured on blockislandtimes.com in a new article, Sunday Travelers on the Ferry: Two Starlings and a Mastiff. Read below for the full content.
We are so proud of this article as it was the FIRST time we were ever in the news!
6/21/10 — Going off on the 8:15 a.m. ferry Sunday headed out of Block Island, a news writer for the Block Island Times suddenly became aware, as did other passengers, of an incessant chirping coming from one of the green booths of the Carol Jean. Upon investigation, she discovered the insistent sounds were coming from a bag holding two baby sparrows that were being fed by wildlife rehabilitator Wendy Taylor, our Executive Director. Volunteering with the Rhode Island Wildlife Clinic in North Kingstown, Taylor, who is an attorney, mostly focuses on waterfowl. “At home I have 11 baby wild turkeys and a baby female mallard. Last week I had a mute swan,” Taylor explained. Other rehabilitators concentrate on other species: “Some do mammals, rabbits, opossums and
squirrels. Others have specific licenses to work with rabies vector species like foxes and raccoons, and one woman does raptors — owls, falcons and hawks.” Taylor was on the ferry coming back from an event called BioBlitz. Though unaffiliated with BioBlitz, by the Rhode Island Natural History Survey that had just brought dozens of scientists to the island for a species count, Taylor said her home borders the Tiverton Land Trust and discovered RINHS when one of their first BioBlitzs took place almost right in her back yard.
On the island for the survey, she did participate and spent time at “science central,” set up on the Lapham property, where she saw a variety of plants, trees, amphibians, mammals, mosses and grasses brought back from all of the participants. Each year, Taylor focuses on a different species so she can get as much of an education in each category as possible. “There were specialties and subspecialties, and it was a great learning experience,” she said.
Comments