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The Not-For-Children Fluffy Bunny Story:
The Cold, Hard Facts about Baby Animals
by Thea Miller Ryan

            It happens every spring across the state. The door to the Game, Fish and Parks office opens and in walks a mom, carrying a box with holes poked in the top, and two little kids with wide, excited eyes. They stopped in to drop off the baby animal they rescued.
            They are excited because they think they’re doing something wonderful. They think they’re helping a baby animal survive because Game, Fish and Parks works with wildlife, and we must have places to raise these animals.
            Sadly, we don’t. Most of these animals met their death sentence when they were picked up off the ground for the first time. As good as people’s intentions are, nature does a better job of raising young animals than any person.
            Nobody at GFP enjoys what happens next. Generally, we turn the mom, kids and box away. We refer them to animal shelters and humane societies who generally have to turn them away as well. The sheer amount of baby rabbits, birds, squirrels, raccoons and fawns is too much.
            Tanya Beckman with Second Chance Rescue outside of Sioux Falls, said “Generally when they bring us these ‘orphan’ cottontails, they end up dying for lack of a natural mother, stress and shock.”
            “Mammal young are sometimes doomed when a human touches them,” Ron Schauer, regional wildlife manager for Game, Fish and Parks, said. “Scents left behind may cause their natural mothers to abandon them. The most harm is done by people who move the young away because they think the mother has abandoned them. Often times mothers will leave their young for short periods of time to feed and care for themselves.” Moving the young just makes it harder for the mothers to find their young again.
            Birds fare better if a human accidentally touches them, but it is still best not to do that because of the stress it can cause. “Most North American bird species do not have a good sense of smell. They won’t be able to smell human contact,” Schauer said.
            Young birds are vocal as well, and their parents can locate them within a small area. Moving a small bird out of the way of the neighbor’s cats or a bicycle tire is okay to do. They can be placed on a low branch or even better back in their original nest.Feeding Time
            Not all young animals that are alone are abandoned. All mammals need to eat to survive. Female rabbits, deer, raccoons and other mammals step away from their young to eat the nutrients that enable them to nurse.
            People stumble across the little nests of rabbits and assume they have been abandoned. “Rabbits don’t have babysitters,” Schauer said. “They have to leave to eat and have not abandoned their nests. Does walk some distance away from their fawns while eating to protect them from predators that might be attracted to the larger deer.”
           
Natural Selection
            Nature is cruel, as they say. Occasionally an animal truly is abandoned by its natural parents for reasons such as illness or injury. But, most often, a young animal that is truly alone is one of nature’s ways of selecting the strongest to survive.
            “People blame the female for thoughtless abandonment,” Schauer said. “But nature has methods built in to select the strongest of the young to survive and keep the population growing.”
            Schauer said in the natural world a 50 percent survival rate for animals like pheasants and ducks would be exceptional. “Nature builds in a lot of challenges and obstacles like predators, weather, and sicknesses to keep the populations in check. The pheasants and ducks lay a larger amount of eggs to ensure enough of their young do survive.”
            The opossum is another example of nature’s built in way of selecting the strongest to survive. Females give birth to three to 17 naked young, about the size of a kidney bean. Those young must crawl into the female’s pouch, where there are generally only 13 nipples. An average of only seven to nine young survives.Legalities
            As good-intentioned as people are, raising a baby game animal, even to release later, is against the law.
            Rearing a game animal is a bad idea for many reasons, Schauer said, first being the legality of it. “It is illegal to possess any game animal in South Dakota, period.” Game animals that are found domesticated must sometimes be dispatched by conservation officers.
            The reasons behind that are many. Domesticated wildlife, even when raised by humans, still retains their natural instincts to mate. That means the animal will get aggressive with other animals or people, and deer will rub their antlers on trees and bushes nearby.Disease
            With the introduction of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in South Dakota, fawns are nearly impossible to place. Game farms, zoos and other states are not interested in housing or rearing deer from outside their confinement due to the possibility of CWD and other diseases spreading into their herd, Schauer said.
            Even a small rabbit brought into the house can spread fleas, ticks or other diseases to household pets.The Bottom Line
            The bottom line is always, “if you care, leave it there,” Schauer said. Females step away to feed, and will return to their healthy young. Young wildlife that are alone or injured can serve as a meal for another wild animal. Their death could prevent the spread of diseases and helps keep a population of that species in check.
            While it might be the hardest thing to do, walk away from wildlife young, he said. “It’s the best thing a person can do.”

Thea Miller Ryan is the director of The Outdoor Campus in Sioux Falls.