Rounds and Treatments

Volunteers help in a variety of ways at RMRP, from taking care of the birds, to office tasks. All volunteers attend rounds and at least one treatment per week. What are rounds and treatments?

Rounds-

Once a week the staff and all the volunteers get together for “rounds.” This one-hour meeting is important because it keeps everyone on the same page. We work on the schedules for all the volunteers, hear case updates on all the birds in rehab. Gail, the RMRP medical director gives us a summary on how all the birds are progressing, new cases, releases, etc. This is a time to share announcements, changes, or sometimes presentations.

Treatments-

A treatment is a block of time scheduled to take care of either the educational birds, or the birds in rehabilitation. For example, the birds in rehabilitation are taken care of in two treatments. The AM treatment covers the diurnal birds (active in the day time- hawks, falcons, kestrals, etc.). The PM treatments involve the nocturnal birds (active at night- owls). There are other treatments that involve the educational birds and the eagles.

Last night at rounds was a time to recognize all the amazing volunteers for all their hard work in the past year. Volunteers were recognized for going above and beyond, whether it was the number of hours they contributed, number of treatments, volunteer trainers, treatment coordinators, etc. The dedication, leadership, time and energy that these volunteers devote to the RMRP is amazing!

Gail, the RMRP medical director is working on the 2009 annual report. She gave us a brief summary. 332 birds came through the RMRP in 2009. That is a lot of raptors!!!! In 2008, the RMRP saw 265 birds. The three species that RMRP saw the most were kestrels, great-horned owls and red-tailed hawks. What a year!!