Port Washington's Fall Decorations Recycled to Feed Recuperating Animals

Port Washington’s festive fall decorations will now serve as a source of food for many recuperating birds and small animals at a Locust Valley-based wildlife hospital.

While admiring the decorated lamp posts around town, which the Greater Port Washington Business Improvement District adorned with corn shocks and orange bows, North Shore Audubon Co-President Jennifer Wilson-Pines noticed the corn shocks were loaded with ears of feed corn and knew they could be put to good use.

Wilson-Pines contacted the BID and asked if she could collect the corn and donate it to Volunteers For Wildlife to help feed the center’s little critters in recovery. Mariann Dailmonte, the BID’s executive director, reached out to the executive board, all of whom approved the idea.

Wilson-Pines, along with her daughters and some of their friends, harvested 18 grocery bags filled with corn, averaging 20 ears of corn per bag. They met Jim Jones, past President and Board member of Volunteers for Wildlife, who took the bags back to the rehabilitation center, located in Bailey Arboretum. Jones is a retired science teacher at Schreiber High School who worked with the Schreiber Key Club and is responsible for installing most of the Osprey nesting platforms in Manhasset Bay and Hempstead Harbor.

Volunteers for Wildlife works to preserve Long Island’s wildlife and natural habitats. They accept and rehabilitate more than 1,000 sick, injured and orphaned wildlife critters each year.

A baby Osprey with a broken wing was recently taken in after a car crash in Bayville downed his nesting platform and killed his two siblings. The Osprey cannot be released, but it will have a permanent home at Friends for Wildlife as an educational ambassador.

For more information on Volunteers for Wildlife, visit here.

The Greater Port Washington BID can be reached here.

Photo via BID: Back row; Jim Jones of Volunteers for Wildlife, Mariann Dalimonte, Executive Director of the BID, Jennifer Wilson-Pines. Front row; Lian Pines, Lela Pines, Amirah Baquira Not shown; Eleanor Chromy