The Northwoods Wildlife Center in Minocqua rehabilitates hundreds of animals each year.
It’s a job Director of Wildlife Rehabilitation Amanda Schirmer thoroughly enjoys.
“Every day is different. I'm not made for a desk job. This definitely is not one. I also enjoy getting to work with such a wide variety of animals in a rehabilitation setting, I always kind of liked the nitty gritty medical part of it. I get to get a part of that as well here. As well as getting to see the best part of rehab, and that is definitely the releases,” said Schirmer.
While she treats animals, Wildlife Educator Bart Kotarba teaches adults and children about them. He’s been at it for over 30 years.
“I love that I have the opportunity to decide to talk about animals to talk about a variety of other things. I do programs on rocks and minerals and fossils and insects,” said Kotarba. “I think what I really like is that Northwoods Wildlife Center is a very small, not for profit. Everyone kind of does everything here. I work on building cages and doing maintenance and things like that, too. There's really never a dull moment.”
While there’s endless options of critters for them to talk about at Thursday night’s Science on Tap-Minocqua, the pair are going to be focused on birds of prey that call the Northwoods home.
“The ambassador we're bringing along was a patient here. We’ll talk about how the bird arrived here,” said Schirmer. “I'll talk about not only her being an education master, but we'll also talk about her being a patient as well.”
As they talk about the research, rescue, rehabilitation, and education that goes into the Northwoods Wildlife Center, Kotarba hopes people walk away from the talk with a better understanding of the birds of prey in the Northwoods.
“I hope that people start to become aware of, really, the wide variety of birds of prey that are found in our area. Sometimes it's just a matter of knowing what's out there, and ways that you can identify them,” said Kotarba.
Schirmer wants to teach people more about the different ailments she sees in the birds that come in hopes that people can help prevent them.
Science on Tap is tonight, January 4, at 6:30 p.m. at Rocky Reef Brewing Company in Woodruff.
