Vertebrate animals are regularly brought into rescue and rehabilitation centers worldwide. Conservation groups and ecologists have acknowledged the untapped potential of rescue databases to inform management of threatened species. However, not all “rescues” are warranted and some species or individuals are more likely to be brought into a rehabilitation center than others. This suggests that the human drivers underlying wildlife rescues are also interesting to consider. However, the scholarly literature has primarily focused on understanding the ecological drivers and implications of wildlife rescues. There has been less consideration of the attitudinal and social drivers that motivate a person’s decision to rescue a particular animal they perceive as needing help. Based on the location of the rescuer, our study investigates the social and ecological drivers of bird rescues using Census, social survey, and bird intake data collected from the Phoenix metropolitan area in 2017-2018.
Results/Conclusions
We found that higher income and pro-ecological worldviews were related to bird intakes, perhaps reflecting a perceived control or responsibility over nature. Conversely, identifying as Hispanic/Latinx, which relates to feeling more interdependent with nature, was negatively associated to rescue occurrence. Ecological drivers of rescues included species commonality and body size. Additionally, people were more likely to bring altricial species (which are born without feathers) into the rehabilitation center, linking to perceptions of young animals as vulnerable. Our findings are relevant to understanding drivers of human-wildlife interactions and for intake centers who wish to reduce the occurrence of people bringing in wildlife that do not actually need to be rescued.