mesage from the director
Dear Friends of the California Raptor Center,
It has been many years, but finally its back! We are thrilled to launch our quarterly California Raptor Center newsletter with the fall quarter, 2017 issue. A lot of amazing things have happened just in the last few months at the CRC. The late heat wave in the Central Valley had our nursery opened much later than usual, with almost twice as many chicks as usual due to the unbearable temperatures. The CRC welcomed Joel Sartore of National Geographic Photo Ark fame to photograph our white-tailed kites for the Ark, which was an amazing experience for everyone. We launched our first (and not last!) FLOAT campaign which helped raise $2700 for the CRC in just one week and gave us cool new CRC swag for our closets! UC Davis renamed our drive to “Raptor Lane” and renovated our museum in the last few months. Finally, through generous donors and foundation grants we have been able to hire Julie Cotton part-time as our Education Coordinator, and she is already working hard and renewing all of the many amazing education programs the CRC has to offer.
Stay tuned for quarterly updates from us sharing all the amazing things going on at the California Raptor Center!
Director, California Raptor Center
SUMMER BABY BOOM
This summer's heat wave was hard on wildlife as well as humans! The California Raptor Center admitted approximately 35 new patients over the course of several days in June, a record high for such a short time. Most of these new patients were babies -- barn owls, Cooper's hawks, and red-shouldered hawks -- that had bailed out of their nests due to the dangerously hot weather.
NAT GEO'S JOEL SARTORE VISITS
On Thursday, August 17 we had the privilege of hosting world-renowned photographer Joel Sartore during his visit to UC Davis. He was in Davis to photograph several animal species and subspecies as part of his National Geographic Photo Ark Project.
A FRESH LOOK: OUR MUSEUM GETS A MAKEOVER
In early fall of 2017, after welcoming thousands of visitors and weathering many rainy winters, the California Raptor Center’s small on-site museum received a much-needed new roof and interior renovation. The need for roof repairs became apparent after the wetter-than-average winter of 2016 led to leaks that threatened the museum’s numerous specimens and exhibits. Recognizing the urgency of maintenance, UC Davis Facilities Management began re-roofing and re-painting the aging building in mid-September.
1ST FLOAT T-SHIRT FUNDRAISER: SUCCESS!
Thanks to the wonderful team at FLOAT (For Love Of All Things) and the generosity of our supporters, we successfully raised $2,700 for the California Raptor Center in just 1 week! We worked with FLOAT's talented artists to develop the burrowing owl design emblazoned on limited edition t-shirts that were available for purchase between August 22-29 only, during which time we received $8 from every item sold.
FEATURED RESIDENT: KALLI, AMERICAN KESTREL
Kalli the American kestrel quickly won over the hearts of our volunteers, and she is sure to do the same for anyone who gets to meet her at the CRC. She arrived here in January of 2017, having been transferred over from the Lindsay Wildlife Experience, where she was dropped off in the fall of 2016 by a family that had, by all appearances, kept her (illegally) as a pet.
She arrived at Lindsay Wildlife with nutritional deficiencies because her finders had not fed her a complete, kestrel-appropriate diet for at least a month. Thanks to the medical treatment she received from licensed wildlife rehabilitators and veterinarians, she is now a physically healthy bird.
WELCOME JULIE, OUR NEW VOLUNTEER & EDUCATION COORDINATOR!
We are pleased to officially welcome the newest staff member to our small team, Julie Cotton!
Julie was born and raised in Washington, D.C., where she spent her childhood enthralled by the urban wildlife that visited her family's yard. She spent her early teenage years convinced that, like a true Washingtonian, she needed to become a lawyer, but her love of biology prevailed, and by high school she was taking college-level marine science classes and interning at the National Zoo.
She went to Washington University in St. Louis for her undergraduate major in Environmental Studies (focused on ecology) and minor in Anthropology. While in St. Louis, she began volunteering at Wild Bird Rehabilitation, a local songbird rehabilitation clinic, and she continued her field studies with an internship doing research in a gull colony. She joined the Animal Behavior Graduate Group at UC Davis in 2011 to pursue a graduate degree in animal behavior.
Before she even moved to Davis, she knew she wanted to continue volunteering in wildlife rehabilitation, so she contacted Bret Stedman at the California Raptor Center and was lucky enough to begin volunteering in her first quarter of grad school. She earned her Master's Degree in 2014 (while still a CRC volunteer), worked for a year at the Lindsay Wildlife Experience in Walnut Creek as an educational interpreter, and began her official position at the CRC in the beginning of 2017.
Please welcome Julie Cotton, our new Education & Volunteer Coordinator!