A Sacramento group that rescued and rehabilitated more than 5,600 injured birds and small animals last year says it urgently needs volunteers as the busy spring season starts.

The group is called the Wildlife Care Association, or WCA. People who find injured critters bring them to the non-profit group's golf ball shaped building at the former McClellan Air Force Base.

"We get everything from hummingbirds to coyotes. So a lot of birds and smaller animals, urban mammals," says Theresa Bielawski with the WCA. Local veterinarians volunteer medical services. And once the animals have recovered and learned to fend for themselves, they're released back into the wild.

Bielawski says the busy season is just beginning, when a lot of wild animals are caring for their young, and for whatever reason, the offspring become injured. That could range from a cat catching a hummingbird to a rainstorm.

"With that kind of weird storm we had on Friday, we took in 51 animals on Saturday and that's a lot for this early in the year," says Bielawski.

"We need volunteers," Bielawski says. "We do training and we have everything from being a phone volunteer at home to coming into the facility and working a shift every week."

Bielawski says the association needs about 200 volunteers.

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