Upcoming docu-series to highlight lifesaving work of Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre

Screengrabs from the trailer for Wildlife ON: Sandy Pines

Eastern Ontario residents will soon be able to view an online docu-series featuring a local lifesaver familiar to anyone who has ever encountered a wild animal in need of help.

Picton-based producer and former local broadcaster Jennifer Lester Mulridge is currently working on Wildlife ON: Sandy Pines; each episode will focus on the rescue and rehabilitation of a different infirm animal brought into the Napanee-based Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre. Viewers will have the opportunity to learn more about both animals and rescuers, as well as the unique southern-Ontario ecosystems they share.

Lester Mulridge told Quinteist that the project is intended to be a short-form, digital-first series. “The first audience will be on YouTube, and there might be other markets that we find from there.”

After taking a break from journalism to have children, Lester Mulridge was ready to get back into the game, but wanted to do so on her own terms.

“I’m really excited about reaching a global audience with really local stories,” she shared.

The idea to feature Sandy Pines was inspired by a show her daughter atches about a similar wildlife rescue in the Maritimes. “Over the years I’ve been watching it and thinking I could really see doing something like that at Sandy Pines,” Lester Mulridge said.

Despite being of the biggest rescues of its kind in Canada, the charity isn’t quite as well-known as it could be, she explained.

“They serve such a wide area of the province, and most people will find themselves needing this service at some point,” she noted. “And a lot of us don’t really know it’s there until we need it. You’ll find a lame animal on the side of the road and you’ll call the cops, or you’ll call the ministry, or public works, and none of them have the resource to deal with that, but they’ll say, ‘call Sandy Pines’.”

Part of the goal in making the film is to spread the word further afield about their work, and hopefully gain access a larger market of donors and supporters.

Director of Sandy Pines, Sue Meech, told Quinteist she also hopes the series will enhance viewers’ appreciation of and respect for wild animals.

“Wildlife are sentient beings and feel pain and suffering emotionally and physically,” she said. “When they are injured or orphaned, they need help, and that is our mandate: to admit and treat injured and orphaned wild ones and release them back into the wild.”

The organization does not receive any government funding, and runs on a team of about 200 volunteers, including veterinarians.

“Some work at the site, some are volunteer drivers that pick up  and deliver our patients to us. We have a group of rescuers that are equipped to deal with hard to catch animals and birds. We also have volunteers that work on fundraisers.”

Each year, about 6,000 wild animals are admitted, including mice, moose, sparrows, eagles and turtles. The most common animal they see depends on the season, ranging from squirrels and rabbits in the spring to raccoons, skunks and deer later in the year.

Wildlife ON: Sandy Pines is currently in production, and Lester Mulridge says it should be available for viewing in the spring.

Learn more about Sandy Pines by visiting their website or Facebook page.

You can also help fund the series by visiting its Go Fund Me page.

A sneak peek of the series is below: