(MA) Recently, Nibi the beaver, a resident of the Newhouse Wildlife Rescue in Chelmsford, MA, gained national attention with her story. Nibi is a two-year-old beaver who has spent almost her entire life in rescue care, having been found as a tiny orphan only a few days old by the side of the road. Rescuers from Newhouse Wildlife Rescue attempted to reunite her with wild adult beavers but were unsuccessful.
For the first five months, the rescuers attempted to find another beaver to raise Nibi alongside, as it is very important to allow young mammals to grow up with their own kind. This helps them with learned behavior and socializing skills and also prevents them from becoming used to only humans. Unfortunately, in all of New England, there were no other orphaned beavers of a similar age in rehab.
As beavers are especially family-oriented and emotional animals, the rescue made the decision not to isolate Nibi, but to give her the attention a young baby requires while they tried their hardest to find another beaver to socialize Nibi with. After five months they finally found another beaver around the same age, but Nibi wanted nothing to do with them. Nor did she want anything to do with any of the other beavers the Wildlife rescue tried their hardest to socialize her with.
Once she was old enough, Nibi was moved to an outside enclosure where her interaction with humans was kept at the absolute minimum to try and prepare her for the wild. But after a year, it became clear Nibi was incredibly depressed on her own, but wanted absolutely nothing to do with other beavers. Once she was allowed to interact with humans again, she finally started to gain weight and grow healthier.
Newhouse Wildlife Rescue knew that the only hope for Nibi to have a happy and healthy future was for her to become an educational beaver, and be allowed to stay with the humans who saved her. They made their request to MassWildlife in July, but there was no response for two months. At the end of September, the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries & Wildlife denied Newhouse Wildlife Rescue's request and ordered they release Nibi within 24 hours.
The Newhouse Wildlife Rescue took this story to Facebook, where it quickly gained national attention, including from several Massachusetts state representatives and even Governor Maura Healey. The heartwarming story came to its happy conclusion when the Governor's office informed Newhouse Wildlife Rescue that Nibi was approved for an educational permit!
But Nibi's story is far from over, and the Newhouse Wildlife Rescue once again took to Facebook with a request for artists' help with a new Nibi project.
What Can Artists Do To Help Nibi?
On Saturday, October 5th, the Newhouse Wildlife Rescue posted a request to all artists for help with their latest project. After the national attention Nibi has received in the past week, there has been a strong demand for Nibi shirts!
The Wildlife Rescue has admitted to having some trouble with the design and feels that a drawing of Nibi would work better than an actual photo. For this reason, they are requesting all artists with drawing skills if they are willing to draw a sketch of Nibi that they could transfer to a shirt.
The post, which can be seen below, goes on to say that anyone interested should post their drawing to the comments section and that the winner's image will be chosen for the t-shirt fundraiser. I for one, will be entering a drawing!
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