Manitoba wildlife rehab centre takes in woodchuck family of 9

The Prairie Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre is keeping an eye out for a woodchuck that might be able to replace Winnipeg Willow;a charming, well-loved educational ambassador and weather prognosticator that passed away earlier this year.

Based on a recent influx of the injured little critters at the centre, the competition for the role could be pretty steep.

• Woodchuck Winnipeg Willow dies days ahead of Groundhog Day

"This is the largest number of woodchucks we've ever had in at one time," said Lisa Tretiak, the president and co-founder of the centre.

"It has been many years before we've had baby woodchucks come through. So we kind of laugh thinking, 'Maybe Willow's sending more woodchucks our way to keep us occupied this summer.'"

Recently, a man living south of Winnipeg brought in a mother woodchuck and eight of her babies after several days of rounding them up. The mother is injured, and appears to be paralyzed in her hind legs.

Initially just five of the babies were delivered to the centre, but on Saturday the remaining three along with the mother were dropped off.

"She's going to help look after her babies, make sure they grow up nice and wild and continue giving them the milk that they would require, and sort of telling them how [to] be," Tretiak said.

"This is why we don't recommend trapping animals at this time because they will have babies, and if you miss out on some of those babies, the babies can either end up dying in their home or come out a few days later, which then puts them in a very critical state where they're dehydrated and sick, and even sometimes hard to bring them back when they've been without food and water for two or three days as a baby."

Turn on lights, turn upbass

Tretiak recommends a different tactic to remove unwanted creatures from yards, woodpiles or beneath buildings.

Placing a radio and a bright light in the cracks and crevices near woodchuck homes can help spook them out and away from homes, Tretiak said. Easy listening tunes won't necessarily cut it, but something with changing tempos and "screaming" works really well, Tretiak said.

"They're living there because it's dark and quiet," Tretiak said. "They don't want it to be bright and noisy, and that will help mom relocate her and all her babies to a new spot."

And the technique isn't uniquely successful against woodchucks alone; it also works with foxes, skunks, raccoons and squirrels.

The radio should be played non-stop for a minimum of four days to scare the critters away, Tretiak said. Once the unwanted residents have evicted themselves, Tretiak said the hole they called home should be walled off or plugged to ensure they don't return.

"Mom doesn't want cranky little babies so she's going to relocate them," she said.

The do-it-yourself nature of Tretiak's pest removal tactic comes with an added bonus: it's free.

"Setting up a live trap and hiring a company to come and remove them, [it's] expensive, they may release [it] or the animal gets euthanized," she said, adding annoying the small mammals with music and light won't cost you a dime. "[Mom] takes her whole family, the cost to you is minimum, they survive and move on."

Keeping woodchuck babies fed

The injured mother woodchuck at the centre will remain in carefor the next few weeks until it's rehabilitated. The babies, now six weeks old, will stay at the centre as long as mom is still there.

"Mom is eating mostly, but I know from having Winnipeg Willow that they eat a lot. We're preparing ourselves for the amount of fruit and vegetables we'll be eating," Tretiak said.

The centre is hoping animal-lovers step forward todonate fruits and vegetables to keep the babies and mom well-fed. The voracious little babies are growing rapidly and Tretiak anticipates they alone will cost as much as $30 a week in fruits and vegetables to feed.

But the financial burden of rearing a litter of wee woodchucks isn't all bad. Tretiak said it brings back fond memories of her time spent with Winnipeg Willow.

"It's a little different because these ones do have a mom and we are trying to make sure these wild ones are going to stay wild," she said.

However Winnipeg Willow may soon have a successor, as the centre is currently caring for an orphaned baby woodchuck. Attempts to integrateherinto the family of woodchucks have been unsuccessful, so her independence makes her a perfect candidate for the job asManitoba's next weather whiz.

With files from Erin Brohman