December 2014

End of the Year Reminders

Posted on December 20, 2014

end-2014 As the end of the year comes to an end, there are certain steps that should be taken to close out the year with your WRMD account. It is much easier not to worry about your previous years data in the new year, as you can imagine. It is a good idea start in fall… that way you are not rushing to do all the work the last week of December.

1. Reconcile your records.

Search for all the animals still pending and make sure that they are closed out completely as long as they are no longer in care.

The federal report requires that the Disposition and/or Transfer type, Disposition date and Criminal activity fields are completed. If it was a transfer, the Disposition Location and State are required as well.

You can also reconcile rescuers. This feature allows you to identify and combine repeat customers. This is more for your own personal data, not so much for reporting.

For your own records it is good to export a report of all the intake numbers with their City found. Many times cities are spelt incorrectly and this will disturb your data.

2. Try to finish up all your records for 2014 in 2014.

In order for the 2014 Federal and State reports to be correct, you need to get all the patients in the system. Use the Quick Admit extension if necessary. You can still add patients into 2014 in 2015, but unless it is done before the reports are sent, the reports will be flawed.

3. This is a good time of year to look at your data and analyze it.

How did the system work for you. Are there trends that you notice, like not identifying the Sex of some of the animals. Is there a certain group that you would like to search, but can’t figure out how to search them all. Try using keywords as a tool. These observations can help you in 2015. You can change a few behaviors to make sure that the data that you want to get out of WRMD is recorded in the first place.

4. We always make a few updates in the new year.

This year we are going to be changing the names of a few fields and merging others in the new records and the intake screens. No previous data will be lost, but it might be in a different section. We will post these changes before the new year to give you time to adjust to them.

As always if you have any questions or concerns just let us know and we will try to help any way we can. Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

IWRC 2014 Recap

Posted on December 9, 2014

We had a blast at the 2014 International Wildlife Rehabilitation Council Symposium in Cincinnati, Ohio this past weekend. We would like to compliment IWRC on their smooth and easy registration, amazing banquet food, choice of hotel and overall positive atmosphere. The best part of the weekend was getting to know so many new people. It is a joy to meet new people and introduce them to Wildlife Rehabilitation MD. We also had the honor to meet some of our current users and discuss with them how they used WRMD and their thoughts on the program. I am happy to announce that almost everybody we meet that uses WRMD says “I love it”. We hope this is the case for all users. We are requesting testimonials from all our users that we can post on our website and blog. We would be delighted to add anybody’s testimonial to our collection. You can email them to [email protected]

I think what makes WRMD so different is that we actively interact with as much of the rehab community as we can. We love learning how other people do stuff and we share our own experiences in the process. Some of our new friends at IWRC had some very poignant questions for us, that we actually get all the time. I thought I might address these common questions about, our organization The Wild Neighbors Database Project.

“What is The Wild Neighbors Database Project and how is it related to Wildlife Rehabilitation MD?”

The Wild Neighbors Database Project is our 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. We saw potential for more than just one project so The Wild Neighbors Database Project was created and our first project was Wildlife Rehabilitation MD “WRMD”. We in the planning phases of 2 other projects to be developed in the future.

“How much does WRMD cost?”

It is a free service. We can not charge wildlife rehabilitators for this service. That money should go to animal care or wildlife rehabilitator income.

“How do you afford to keep it going then?”

We mostly rely on generous donations from our users, but also will receive some money from grants that we are working on. If you are willing to make an end of the year gift to The Wild Neighbors Database Project we would gladly accept it. There is a Donate button on our homepage for our PayPal account or we accept checks mailed to us at The Wild Neighbors Database Project 3800 Vista Oaks Dr., Martinez, CA 94553.

“Why are you doing this and what do you get out of it?”

We do this because we want to help wildlife rehabilitators by giving them an intuitive and user friendly tool to collect incredibly valuable data about what our profession does. There is so much data that has not been collected or recorded. That knowledge is disappearing as our previous generation retires and passes away. They are the founders of our professional field and we should not have to reinvent the wheel for that which has already been done, just add to it as our knowledge grows. We saw a need, that we were skilled for, and we decided to dedicate our lives to filling that need. We are wildlife rehabilitators, we do what we do because we care, that is what makes our profession so special. We actually care for more than ourselves or our lively hoods or the human race, we care for the planet and her innocent inhabitants that have no voice.

“Are you crazy?”

Yes, probably, aren’t we all.

Thank you,
Rachel Avilla
Co-founder of The Wild Neighbors Database Project/Customer Care WRMD

Updated USFWS Annual Report

Posted on December 5, 2014

!! Attention US Users of WRMD !!

We’ve just been made aware that US Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS) has updated their Wildlife Rehabilitation Annual Report with new sections and requirements. We are currently updating our version to comply with USFWS’s changes. One new section (Section A) is Birds Held Over and asks for “each individual bird that was held over from any previous report year for continued care.” Which is different from the previous form which asked for “birds held 180 days or longer as of 12/31 of the report.” This means that if you do not have records in WRMD for 2013 then this section will be blank.

As soon as we have the report in WRMD updated we’ll let you know!

For you reference here is a link to the new annual report, http://www.fws.gov/forms/3-202-4.pdf and a link to the older version, https://wrmd.org/pdf/annual-reports/USFWS-3-202-4-9-10.pdf.

Update – Dec 9, 2014

Just an FYI that we’ve updated the USFWS Rehabilitation Annual Report to comply with the new requirements.

On that topic of the Annual Report, don’t forget to fill in the Nature of Injury field on the Initial Care page as well as check the Criminal Activity check-box for those birds that had any reported injuries or mortalities. This includes anything shot, poisoned (confirmed), electro-cuted, trapped (e.g., foot-hold), or otherwise injured or killed as the result of a potentially criminal activity. By checking that check-box your Section C will be filled out.

-Your Welcome!