Wildlife rescue closes service amid daily 'misuse'

The charity is facing increased costs due to increased capacity

A wildlife rescue charity has announced its temporary closure after reaching "maximum capacity" and dealing with what it called daily misuse of its public hotline.

Blyth Wildlife Rescue has worked across Newcastle and Northumberland since 2006 to help and rehabilitate a variety of animals, but has recently faced an unprecedented level of demand.

In July alone, the charity received 2,896 calls from across Tyneside and admitted almost 300 new casualties while dealing with "critically low" funds.

The rescue service will continue to care for its current animals and hopes to keep its emergency hotline for larger animals open, such as deer, foxes and badgers, but will cease to assist with small mammals and birds.

In a post on social media, the Blyth Wildlife Rescue cited its already stretched workload was being "greatly burdened by the misuse of our charity’s helpline".

Sara Perry, a volunteer medic at the charity, said it faced "daily" calls on the emergency line that were not serious in anyway.

On Thursday, someone called to say there was a seagull in their garden.

"There was nothing wrong with it," said Ms Perry. "No specialist rescue was needed."

The wildlife charity will continue to care for its 170 current patients

The charity has said it will look at how it will work in the future and if any permanent cut backs need to be made after it addresses its funding and resource issues.

Ms Perry said it normally cost £80,000 to run the charity each year but, by January, it had spent £10,000 alone on herring fish for its two seal pups.

"It's going to be an expensive year for us," she said. "It's always in the back of our minds that we have to get the funds, or we can't take the animals in."

Alongside the announcement of the closure of its services, Blyth Wildlife Rescue launched a £20,000 appeal to address its current shortfall.

"I get to see the good work the charity does when we finally release animals back into the wild," Ms Perry added. "It's at the forefront of every decision we make."