Young wildlife are beginning to make their appearance. Without a doubt, these young birds and animals are cute and so much fun to watch. It is a great temptation for people to pick up a young bird, bunny, or even a fawn to take home and have as a pet.

Not only is taking wildlife home illegal, it is also dangerous and these animals and birds from the wild can carry diseases. Through the years as a wildlife officer, I encountered many incidents, in which people picked up young wildlife that turned into disasters.

I received a call from a schoolteacher, saying she had a student bring in pigeon eggs, which led the class to attempt hatching the eggs as a project. The teacher borrowed an incubator, and the eggs were placed inside. Much to the students’ surprise they were successful.

In just a few days, the eggs hatched. Now they had a problem as they didn’t know what to do with the young pigeons. The teacher’s call went like this, “What can we feed them?”

My reply was “Well, in the wild, both the parent birds produce milk from the lining of their crop. This milk is appropriately called pigeon milk. It is very rich, and I doubt if you could duplicate it. I suggest that you place the young in an active pigeon’s nest and hope that the adults will adopt them. I really don’t think you’ll be able to hand-raise them.”

Although she did not say why the eggs were picked up, it was apparent to me that they were just robbed from a nest. Pigeons have no protection under the game laws. They were brought to this country from Europe, where they are referred to as rock doves. If you study pigeons, you’ll find them to be very interesting.

They come in a wide variety of colors.

Occasionally I received calls from people that had picked up young skunks, thinking they would make nice pets. After feeding and handling the young skunk for several days, the family would decide to call the veterinarian to have it fixed so it could not spray. A call would be made, and the office person would reply that the veterinarian did not want to handle the skunk due to the fear of rabies, and because it was illegal to pick up a skunk.

Now the caller became frightened.

The family doctor was contacted and the person was advised to have the skunk checked for rabies. By that time many people had handled the young skunk and if it did have rabies, all would need to get some medical attention. At this point, I was called. Now they were faced with the possibility of paying a fine.

I advised the caller to kill the skunk and take it to a lab to be tested. If the test came back negative, they were lucky, however, if the young skunk had escaped or proved positive for rabies, the callers were in for expensive medical treatments. All of this was just because someone wanted to have a wild pet.

Many young raccoons are also picked up. One day I received a call from a man who said that he had picked up a young raccoon for his family to raise. At first, the family thought the baby raccoon was so cute but in a short time, the animal became mean and bit his child. He wanted me to pick up the raccoon and release it in the wild. There was no way I could release the raccoon into the wild because the young animal would have wandered (unafraid) into another yard.

In a short time, I would have received another call to come get the animal. Of course, the animal had to be euthanized and checked to see if it had rabies. The caller ended up paying a fine.

Before the commission issued tranquilizer guns to its officers, I received a complaint on a fully grown tame deer that was destroying a woman’s garden. The woman told me that the deer showed up one day and stayed. The deer was tame and even allowed her to pet it. I rounded up several deputies with the idea that we would tackle and hogtie the deer and take it away.

Well the deer allowed the woman to get close but not us. After many attempts, the deer finally went down an outside cellar way. The woman told us that she would grab the deer and hold it until we could get close enough to take over. The woman approached the deer in the cellar way however being trapped and frightened, the deer gave a jump and kicked the woman on the bridge of her nose. The frames of her glasses became imbedded in her nose, with the result that she began to bleed quite profusely. She received medical attention and had several stitches. We finally tackled and hog tied the deer, which was later taken to the deer pens at Penn State University.

Problems such as these became easier after we were issued tranquilizer guns.

Many calls were received about young birds, especially young robins. Every year someone would come to our home carrying a young robin and tell us that the bird fell out of its nest and after putting it back in its nest, the bird kept falling out. In each case, the person would tell me that the poor bird was abandoned.

The truth is that the robin had left the nest and fluttered to the ground. Here the bird was being taken care of by the male, while the female was constructing another nest.

Many times, young animals and birds taken from the wild must spend the rest of their lives in pens. Not bad you might say. Someone to take care of the deer for the rest of its life. Sounds good.

However, anyone who has ever been incarcerated will say that losing one’s freedom is the worst thing that can possibly happen to a person. It’s also the worst possible thing that can happen to a wild animal.

Through the years, young rabbits, squirrels, turkeys, bear cubs, grebes and even beaver were brought into my home after being picked up.

Several times I had birds turned in to me because they couldn’t fly. Many of these birds were grebes. The grebes were usually adult birds that had landed on a wet parking lot or some other place that resembled a lake to the bird. Once on the ground the grebe could not take off because it needed to run to take off. A grebe’s legs are placed far back on their body, making it unable to walk normally.

On the water, the bird can paddle and gain enough speed, which allows it to become airborne. Anyone handling a grebe without heavy gloves is sure to end up with bloody hands. I’m speaking from experience.

When you see young wildlife go ahead and take pictures but leave them in the wild. If you really think the bird or animal needs help, call the game commission and let them decide if the animal really needs help.

Bill Bower is a retired Pennsylvania Game Commission Wildlife Officer. Read his blog and listen to his podcasts on the outdoors at www.onemaningreen.com.