Driving in Response...
It begins with a voice down the line from Secret World’s office with words very familiar to any of you who are Secret World Response Drivers (SWRDs): Hello …. Are you free to go on a call-out?” It takes a very strong will to say, “No”! For at the beginning of this line of communication you know that there is a wild creature in distress, pain or danger, beyond self help. If Secret World doesn’t respond, probably nobody will. And it doesn’t take attendance at too many cases for the huge value and satisfaction of this work to hit home.
I’ve been a SWRD for some seven years now, and I love it. I came to the work with absolutely no previous experience of dealing directly with wildlife. My richest personal encounters did not go beyond a passing glimpse of a badger in headlights or a distant view of a fox loping across a meadow. All I could offer was a passive interest in the beauty of nature, and a willingness to learn and to help. I didn’t quite realise at the outset how very personally rewarding it would be.
When you first become a SWRD basic training and guidance are of course provided but, as with most things in life, the real learning comes and grows with experience. My very first call-outs were for smaller creatures like garden birds and hedgehogs, often already caught and boxed by the finder. It wasn’t long, however, before I entered the deep end with my first badger and my first swan. These two species have become the most frequent and, I must admit, personal favourite targets of the rescue missions I get sent out on. It is indicative of the magnitude of the work that Secret World does that I, just one member of the band of volunteer rescuers, in one year went out for thirty badgers and thirty one swans. Then there are the foxes, the deer, the birds of prey, the sea birds, and still the
Graeme rescuing a swan.
small mammals and garden birds. Once there was even a Russian hamster!!!
The opportunity to get so close and to help to serve the needs of all these creatures is a huge privilege, and also humbling. Such personal acquaintance, the chance to appreciate at close quarters the wondrous nature of every kind of creature be it swan or starling, roe deer or harvest mouse, really puts into perspective the place of we human beings on this planet.
The sad bit comes, of course, when a patient doesn’t pull through but just dies, or has to be put down by a member of the animal care staff because its injuries are beyond repair. But even then you have to recognise, with maybe a tear in your eye, that you have helped it by tenderly ending its suffering.
The joyous part comes every time a creature is released back into the wild. No better example than when, in January, the Secret World team released together, in one huge event, thirty four of the swans that had been rescued from certain death in the big freeze. Then a tear really did come to the eye!
Graeme Thompson 13
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