Long Island Rescue Group Saves Gaggle Of Animals Over Thanksgiving Holiday

LONG ISLAND, NY — The volunteers from Strong Island Animal Rescue were kept busy over Thanksgiving with multiple calls from residents across Long Island seeking help for fuzzy and furry friends alike.

On Thanksgiving Eve, Frankie Floridia received a call about an owl that was struck by a car and became lodged in the car's grill on Sunken Meadow Parkway. The raptor's predicament forced Floridia to have to disassemble the front end of the car to remove the owl.

The bird was taken to Sweetbriar Nature Center in Smithtown where it is doing well, Floridia said.

A buck with its antlers stuck in barbed wire in a sump was also freed in Port Jefferson.

Floridia and his family were just getting ready to start Thanksgiving dinner when he received a call about a cat with possibly broken legs stuck in between the opening of two gates on a fence in Ronkonkoma. The cat likely was struck by a car and then crawled to the location where it was noticed by a good Samaritan.

It was trapped for at least a half hour before Floridia arrived to spirit it away to a veterinarian for x-rays. At first blush, the cat's prognosis was not good.

"You couldn't have called me at a better time; I'm ecstatic," he said Tuesday. "At first we thought his back was broken and he needed to be euthanized, but it's only the pelvis, so he is expected to make a full recovery with bed rest."

"The cat is a survivor, so that is a good story," he said.

The day after Thanksgiving, a family of raccoons seeking shelter from the cold wandered down a chimney and entered a Patchogue home through its fireplace. With a little tact, Floridia scared the family back up the chimney using a radio and bright light.

The trio were "safely evicted," Floridia said.

The fireplace was then closed off and the homeowners then obtained a cap for the chimney to stave off any future visits from wildlife.

On Sunday, a deer that became lodged between two fences in Port Jefferson was freed only to scamper away off into the woods.

And on Monday night, Floridia rescued a domestic duck and a chicken that had apparently been abandoned by people who moved out. The pair had been huddling for warmth in a window well and were surviving on food left by a neighbor.

The pair were brought to Floridia's house to recuperate, and it is expected that they will be adopted out as pets at some point.

"They'll never be used as food; they'll find homes," he said.

The weekend's busy turn of events has several lessons, including that residents should reach out to rescuers for help if they can't "handle them anymore."

Professional help should always be sought when deer are stuck in fences because it "can be incredibly dangerous if not done the right way," according to Floridia.

With raccoons, it's better to safely evict them with a bright light and radio, rather than pay an exterminator several hundred dollars to kill them.

But this is the time of year when they are entering homes with holes, so it's better to shut them out now, he warned.

"They go into the houses within the next few months and have babies there in the springtime," he said, adding that is when he is inundated with calls. "They want me to evict them and there's seven babies up there, and it's the hardest thing in the world to do."