TREVOR WEEKS: Half marathon efforts raise more than £1,600 for WRAS

A lady had found a hedgehog with a circular wound on its back moving across the road. On closer inspection the hedgehog smelled terrible so she boxed him up and called WRAS straight away.

I had only just arrived home at Uckfield from giving a talk to Micheldene WI at East Dean when the call came in. So I jumped back into my ambulance and rushed back down to Seaford.

The hedgehog had what looked like a strimmer or spade injury across its back which was not fresh. Dealing with these sorts of injuries is not pleasant.

Back at WRAS’s Casualty Centre I set about treating the hedgehog and cleaning up his injuries. He was eventually bedded down and straight away started tucking into his cat food and hedgehog biscuits. Casualty managers Chris and Katie worked on him further the following day and we have our fingers and toes crossed he will make a fully recovery.

With a little bit of good weather we have been able to get some casualties out for release this week. More than 15 casualties have been released this week. Two magpies went home, one who had an eye injury and another who had his foot badly entangled in discarded human hair losing a couple of toes.

We didn’t think he would get enough use of the foot back for release but after three weeks in an indoor pen both were raring to go. A lovely black and white feral pigeon rescued by Chris a month ago has also been released as well as two other feral pigeons from Langney and Hampden Park.

A wood pigeon has also been released in Barcombe, he came in so collapsed that Katie sat up with him not expecting him to even survive the night. She did such an amazing job he has now been released, so well done Katie.

Three doves have also been released as well as two of our longest term wood pigeons, one who recovered from a fractured shoulder and the other from losing all the feathers on both wings, both have been in one of our indoor pen since October and December.

A feral pigeon has also been released by Tony in Newhaven who was found trapped in a building a few weeks ago. Two more hedgehogs have also gone into outside pens for the rest of the winter. We are close to releasing a number of other birds as well who are just having final flight practices after various injuries too.

Thank you to everyone for their support on Sunday with the Eastbourne Half Marathon. It was a very difficult day. I woke not feeling well and from 6am in the morning spent most of my time in the bathroom! Not wanting to let anyone down I managed to pull myself together and headed to Eastbourne. I met up with my colleague Chris and his partner Laura gave us a lift to the start. The weather was terrible but as we approached the start time it cleared up. My knee has been causing me quite a few problems and apparently I have an IT band problem.

I knew my knee was not going to cope with running the entire half marathon, but wanted to do my best so tried to run and walk sections. The steep downhill into Hollywell proved too much for my knee and I struggled from that point onwards.

By the time I got to the Fishermans Green which was about the seven mile mark I suddenly felt really faint and had to sit down. I was burning off too much energy and my knee was shouting at me too.

I must say a huge thank you to the lady who very kindly gave me her energy drink and tablets to pick me up, and within a few minutes I was back on my feet and able to push on again. There was no way I would run with my knee so I had to do my best to walk the rest of the route. I did not want to let anyone down. Chris was amazing support and kept me going and was a real gentleman letting me cross the finishing line before him.

More than £1,670 has been raised via just giving for East Sussex WRAS which is an amazing amount to help support our charity and means a lot to me, so thank you all for your support.

I would also like to thank all the volunteers at the road crossings and water stops as well as the organisers of the Half Marathon for a brilliant event and for everyone’s words of encouragement.

This photo of my crossing the finishing line is courtesy of Jonathon Dunville.

Every year between 2,000 and 3,000 calls are made to WRAS’s rescue line. Our rescuers are all volunteers and are funded by kind donations from people like you.

For more information visit the website, http://wildlifeambulance.org/