A veterinary team from southern Ontario has driven up to Thunder Bay to provide care for cats and dogs displaced by the region’s wildfires.
More than a dozen communities, including several First Nations in the northwest, are under evacuation this wildfire season.
There are about 185 active wildfires across Ontario, according to the latest numbers from the province. Forest fire hazards are largely low across the region following recent rainfall and a drop in temperatures — a stark contrast from last week’s heatwave.
Still, more than 2,400 evacuees and counting are staying in host communities across Ontario — many of them either leaving their pets at home or with foster families.
Members of the Community Veterinarian Program, operated by Vets Around the Corner based in Port Perry, arrived in Thunder Bay over the weekend to set up a field hospital at the city’s Grandview Arena.
The team offers mobile services out of a retrofitted ambulance, which they drove up to Armstrong Monday afternoon to check in on pets left behind. Their plan was to give the animals some calming sedatives before driving them south to safety.
“They’re feeling the same things that we are. They’re feeling anxiety, they’re stressed, they feel pain, they feel emotions,” said William Woodstock, chief executive officer of Vets Around the Corner as well as founder and board chair of the Community Veterinarian Program.
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“When they are being evacuated, they’re going into a community they don’t know, and unlike humans where we can have a conversation and we can let each other know what’s happening, they don’t necessarily know. They feel our own stress as well.
“It’s really important for us to take care of them because at the end of the day, the animals, they take care of us.”
The team has been co-ordinating with the Ontario Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (OSPCA) and Northern Reach Network to care for animals coming in and out of Thunder Bay.
The OSPCA has provided the veterinary team with donations as well as a surgical suite, while Northern Reach Network has helped connect animals with foster families.
“The veterinarians [in Thunder Bay] are quite over capacity when it comes to taking care of pets,” Woodstock said. “We’re kind of reducing that burden on the community.”
Ben Whitburn dropped by the Grandview Arena’s field hospital Monday afternoon to get some medication for Buddy. The two-year-old dog came from Whitesand First Nation, one of several communities north of Thunder Bay forced to evacuate due to wildfires.
Whitburn said he responded to the Northern Reach Network’s calls for foster families, and that the organization provided all the supplies he needed.
Buddy is believed to be a stray. While there is a family in the First Nation that checks up on him, they weren’t able to take him to their accommodations in Thunder Bay.
“He’s very well-behaved, gets along great with my Golden Retriever, so it’s been a nice addition to the house,” said Whitburn, who has never fostered a dog before.
Whitburn said others should consider taking in a cat or dog to alleviate the burden on rescues.
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“They’ve already lost so much,” Whitburn said of the wildfire evacuees. “Super easy to do … it’s really you just opening up some space in your house for another pet.”
Woodstock said the Community Veterinarian Program does not receive government funding and needs monetary donations. Cat and dog food is also being accepted at the Grandview Arena.
As for the volunteers themselves, “we heard something about local Persians being a dessert [in Thunder Bay] — we haven’t had any of those yet,” Woodstock added.
