In 2012 I began as a Wildlife Rescuer Volunteer with Wildlife Victoria.
I was very privileged to meet many wonderful people in my various travels to shelters delivering Wildlife that would be rehabilitated by them prior to be returned to the wild.
On a really raining day I was taking a very upset and very loud Rainbow Lorikeet to Frank and Sue of Macloud Animal Shelter - I had never met them prior to this, only ever spoken of the phone to them to get advice. I arrived with my ears ringing from the non-stop screeching of the poor bird.
Frank took one look at me and said - you need to hold this.
"This" was a kangaroo joey, I immediately forgot about my ringing ears and long car trip (at that stage I was still working out distances in Melbourne so I often headed out to rescues far and wide relying just on GPS hahaha - I guess it was one way of learning about the distances in Melbourne and the surrounding regions).
I asked Frank and Sue what it would take for me to become more involved with the caring of amazing creatures I was out rescuing. Sue kindly took me on a foster carer and I went to their shelter almost daily to help with cleaning, with feeds and transporting to vet visits or to the next stage of release.
I remember clearly the day when Frank and Sue said "you take this little one home, he is yours to foster" and I brought little Thomas the tiny brushtail home.
He weighed 48g and my life revolved around 2 hourly feeds with regular calls to Sue in a blind panic because he only eaten 2mls of his formula instead of 3ml.
After a year of caring for him, he now weighed 4kgs and we were able to take him to a magnificent soft release site.
Thomas the day he was released. Sniffling leaves before racing up the tree.