I happen to LOVE watching the wild birds around my house. Ever since I was a little girl I have watched wild birds... and oddly one time we had a wild blue jay living around our house that watched me! Here in my backyard I have seen Kestrels, Flickers, Pileated Woodpeckers, Downy Woodpeckers, Robins, Sparrows, Juncos, Chickadees, so on and so forth. When this project came to my attention I thought it was a really lovely way for knitters and crocheters to become involved with conservation. Its also a great way to get youngsters involved. Motivating them to learn to knit or crochet for our feathered friends. First we'll start with the who: WildCare's website states " "Everyone wants to do the right thing for wildlife... WildCare is here to help! We're located in downtown San Rafael, California — Marin County's largest city — making us a truly urban wildlife hospital. Marin has grown a lot since our inception in 1974, and as the county stretched into the wild places that surrounded it, people and wildlife found themselves calling the same place home. We work to make sure all species can coexist-- not just by treating sick or injured animals (over 3,000 of them a year), but also by teaching people how to live peacefully with wildlife and by advocating for better protection of wildlife and our remaining open spaces. This integrated approach is essential to WildCare, and we address both the symptoms of human/wildlife interaction and their underlying causes. By doing so, we hope to create a more sustainable world for all." http://www.wildcarebayarea.org/site/PageServer?pagename=About At one point the folks at WildCare realized that the makeshift bowls in which they were placing the rescued baby birds were leaving bruises or injuries on the birds. They put out a call for help and true to form the fiber arts community answered with a great alternative. Hand knit or crocheted nests! Brilliant right? I thought so too. The baby birds all tucked safely in the cozy knit nests This image: http://www.wildcarebayarea.org/site/PageServer?pagename=babybirdnest_homepage Now for the what: The response to the original call for nests was so fantastic that they extended the opportunity to knitters and crocheters all around the world. According to the WildCare Baby Bird Nest website "The 2014 Baby Bird Nest Campaign was a great success! We collected over 3,500 nests and outfitted WildCare’s hospital along with over a dozen others throughout the United States. We had over 350 different crafters donate nests from all over the US, Canada, Australia and the Ukraine. Many of the bird hospitals we outfitted are individuals who work out of their homes and who simply don't have the resources to run a campaign like this. They were very grateful for the nests. The campaign was covered by NBC Nightly News, the San Francisco Chronicle, Huffington Post, KPIX Channel 5 News, KTVU Channel 2 News, the Marin Independent Journal, and dozens of other television stations, independent blogs and websites." Who? YOU of course! Everyone can be involved with helping baby birds at WildCare by donating money of course because baby birds gotta eat! OR check out the t-shirt and mug collection http://wildcare-wild-merchandise.myshopify.com/collections/baby-songbirds! If you are a knitter or a crocheter there is a simple matter of filling out the Nest Pattern Request Form and you'll get an email with the specific patterns needed for this project. Are you a Raveler?
http://www.ravelry.com/groups/baby-bird-nest-campaign. And of course you can find WildCare on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/WildCareBayArea?fref=nf. The MOST important thing to do is spread the word about this great project. Everyone has an opportunity to engage with this group in one form another. Teachers, parents, kids, 4H Groups, Girl Scouts/Guides, church youth groups, local assisted living homes, YMCA, inner city, town or even small country village. Its fun and like WildCare's slogan says "Live Well With Wildlife"!
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Author**Opinions expressed on blogs about which I write are the opinion of the blog authors and DO NOT necessarily reflect my own opinion. |