Wildlife Waystation

4:30am - Alarm goes off. Really?

5:30am - Go to Studio Animal Services to pick up Echo the dog who I will be working with on set today.

6:30am - Drive to Culver City for an 8:00am call. Consider for a second, no traffic (I know that's just crazy) and this drive would take me 30 minutes. Now consider a normal day driving in Los Angeles, I have to allow myself 1 1/2 hours to get there. As I am driving by myself I cannot use the carpool lane, so that makes it worse. I consider putting Echo in the passenger seat wearing a big floppy hat and reading a newspaper, to knock at least 1/2 hour off the drive?

7:45am - Arrive on set. First stop breakfast from the caterer - I stick with a semi-healthy omelet over a Krispy Kreme donut. I think I made the right choice.

9:30am - Echo works. Echo annoys me. Everyone thinks Echo is doing great except me. Don't they see how naughty she is being. Echo sit. Echo stay. Oh Echo.

10:30am - We are wrapped. Thank God. I'm not talking to Echo.

11:30am - I get back to Studio Animal Services and drop off Echo. Thoughts of my couch and a nap are floating around my head.

1:00pm - Nap over. I check my email and notice Val (our office girl at work) has posted on Facebook that my boss and David have left to help evacuate the Wildlife Waystation I call David, they need more help, so I drive back to work, hook up our other trailer to one of the vans, load some crates and take off.

1:30pm - I check for road closures and grab a bite to eat (this was a smart move as food is limited in the wilderness). I sail through three road blocks with no problems, maybe because I am heading into the fire zone with an empty horse trailer?

2:30pm - Arrive at Waystation. I am now in line behind about 12-15 rigs waiting to get in and load up animals. I go to check in and see what going on.

3:00pm - Its like old home week. Trainers from far and wide have shown up to help Martinne (the owner of the Waystation) get her animals out safely.

3:30pm - Paul and David head down into the compound to load up. The fire department is only allowing one rig at a time into the facility. I figure by the time I get in there it might be about this time tomorrow!

5:30pm - I am moved up the list and allowed to enter the compound purely because I have crates in my van and they need them to load the small animals.

The goal is to load everything that is manageable first and save the big cats, bears, chimps (all or most need darting/tranquilizing so they can be safely moved into cages for transport) for later.

6:30pm - I drive down, unload the crates and start what will be the first of several times that I am required to back my van and trailer into some tight corners.



Let me give you a brief scenario of my trailering skills.

Studio Animal Services mainly uses vans for the purpose of transporting animals to set. Only on the rare occasion we have 10-15 dogs working do we load the trailer with crates and drive the rig to set. Therefore over the years, I have driven the truck and trailer maybe 4 - 5 times a year. Compared to the animal companies that haul livestock and wild animals on a daily basis, you can see how I may have somewhat limited skills! So given all that, one of the things (actually two things) I try to avoid is getting myself into a precarious position and doing any kind of maneuvering while having an audience. Well...my trailering skills were put to test, but I did come out of it dignity still in tact. It did help that everyone was super supportive and encouraging, even though it felt like my head might explode on the seventh time I was asked to back up!

8:30pm - Pulled out of the Waystation with one ostrich and two pigs. I was following Paul who had three ostrich in his trailer and together we drove to Pierce College where we were instructed to go and unload animals.

10:00pm - We arrive at Pierce College only to find confused volunteers contemplating the housing of four (not very nice) ostrich and two pigs.

10:02pm - At this point I was contemplating the chances of Paul and I successfully unloading these four ostrich out of the trailer and into horse stalls by ourselves. I thought our chances were pretty slim.

10:03pm - I call some trainers and soon have Chrissie with us and Victoria on her way.

10:30pm - Pierce College deemed the whole operation to dangerous and we were sent on our way.

10:32pm - I started making some calls and finally got a hold of Phil who said we could bring them to his ranch. He had been at the Waystation earlier and had evacuated zebra, llama and emu.

11:00pm - Arrive at Phils - we leave all the animals in the trailers to be unloaded in the morning and we drive home.

The Station Fire continues to burn even today 2 1/2 weeks later. Full containment is now expected to be September 15th, it is the largest wildfire in L.A. county history burning over 160,000 acres. And...officially, our fire season hasn't even started.

The fire burned around the Waystation and today most of the animals have been returned.

All photos taken by myself except the bear and tiger photo: Al Seib/LA Times and the above view of fire from ridge: Wally Skalij/LA Times.

The video below is a compilation of little clips I took throughout the day.