This past weekend, I took a friend’s baby daughter for a long walk (or, more accurately, a long push – she can’t yet walk, so was in a buggy/stroller). The ducks that reside at a nearby lake are usually a safe bet when one wants to keep this particular child entertained, so that’s where we headed.
As the baby clapped and giggled at the animals – They’re not that funny, I sniffed. She kept laughing anyway. Kids, eh? A man arrived on the shore carrying a cage that contained a baby duck. He had rescued the animal the week before, he told me, after a member of the public had called the Folly Wildlife Rescue to report that the duck was caught in some fishing line. Initially, it was believed that the duck would have to have its leg amputated, but fortunately the vets were able to save the animal’s life and its leg.
I asked the man about Folly Wildlife Rescue, and he told me that it is an exclusively volunteer effort, with absolutely no form of government subsidy or other state support. It relies entirely on donations from the public and its own fund-raising activities. He himself is not paid a penny for the time and effort he puts in to this endeavour, and neither is anyone else involved.
In addition to the entirely noble goal of trying to educate the public about how they can prevent accidental injury to animals and caring for those animals when they do get hurt, I approve wholeheartedly of people taking the initiative to launch and maintain this kind of volunteer effort. It is refreshing to see Folly Wildlife Rescue performing such an admirable service without relying on the state to write the cheques. And I am pleased that they get enough donations to treat thousands of animals and inform the public about the dangers posed to wildlife by seemingly innocuous activities.
For years, Folly Wildlife Rescue – including its intensive care unit and other medical facilities – has been run from the home of Annette and Dave Risley in the Kent and East Sussex borders area of South East England. Due to the huge volume of animals they are treating, this is an impractical set of circumstances, both presently and in the long term. Because the price of property in this area of England is so high, it is expected that Folly Wildlife will have to spend at least £400,000 (more than $730,000US at current exchange rates) in order to buy suitable premises for their operation.
If you are at all impressed with the dedication shown by the volunteers who run and raise funds for this rescue operation that is untainted by money taken from taxpayers, I would ask you to consider throwing a few ducats their way. If you are not able to do that, you could support them by using their Amazon affiliation link when you shop at that online store, or simply drop them an email (address here) to let them know you are behind them and wish them luck. After all, someone has got to give injections to sick badgers and put bandages on injured hedgehogs, and I am pretty glad it is not me.
More to the point, Folly Wildlife Rescue is the kind of thing any supporter of a smaller government should gaze upon with gratitude. Please consider doing what you can to communicate that gratitude to the people behind the effort.
Jackie, that is a very nice and apposite post. I would also give an unashamed plug to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, which is also financed by voluntary means, and which has saved the lives of thousands of seafarers since it was founded in the 19th century.
Examples like this are extremely important because they demonstrate how it is possible for the benevolence of human beings to flourish without, and in fact despite of, the ever present hand of the State.
In Australia we always like to bring up the example of the Surf Lifesaving Association, which is the volunteer lifeguard organisation that patrols most of our beaches.
Examples like this are extremely important because they demonstrate how it is possible for the benevolence of human beings to flourish without, and in fact despite of, the ever present hand of the State.
That was what I was thinking as I spoke to the man from Folly Wildlife, but I decided to spare him a monologue on the subject. I could well imagine one of my beloved statist acquaintances making a tearful plea on behalf of the furry ones — “But if the state doesn’t rescue them, who will?” Well, now we know.
I was also pleasantly surprised that the man from Folly Wildlife didn’t have an attitude that the government should be bankrolling their operation.
Johnathan Pearce writes:
“Jackie, that is a very nice and apposite post. I would also give an unashamed plug to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, which is also financed by voluntary means, and which has saved the lives of thousands of seafarers since it was founded in the 19th century.”
Strangely enough, I was very close to posting the same sentiments, having, today, visited a disused lifeboat house which was closed in 1928, the day the entire crew of the lifeboat was lost at sea, attempting to rescue a ship in distress.
This boat was manned from a tiny community and the plaque reminds us how these unpaid volunteers sacrificed someimes several generations of a single family in a storm.
I really appreciated Jackie D’s post – and Mr. Pearce’s comment – I hope they will help the collectivists and statists, finally, to understand.
Sorry – I eat ducks rather than arrange hospitalisation and housing. Even if it is in the private sector.
But my best wishes to you. Get them back on their feet, fill ’em full of corn and make ’em into Fois Gras and I will be forever grateful.
Paul, Paul. Make foie gras out of geese like God intended, and leave the poor ducks alone.
Well spotted, Jackie. We should do a blog for them once we get the business off the ground enough to do some good for free.
It is encouraging that there are still people who will do this sort of good work without expecting any reward for it.
Doesn’t sound like a “folly” at all.
Incidentally, this reminds me of Milton Friedman’s point in Free To Choose, that just about all the great charitable institutions in the United States date back to the high Victorian period–everything from the Salvation Army to the A.S.P.C.A.–to the era when we came closest to greedy old selfish capitalism.