Husband-and-wife team turns passion for rescuing birds into a growing Northern Michigan mission
INTERLOCHEN - What began as a labor of love in their own home for Northern Michigan couple Kaitlyn and Jeffrey Bohnet has grown into a wildlife rehabilitation operation answering hundreds of calls to help injured birds. Now, the husband-and-wife team is working to take the mission of North Sky Raptor Sanctuary a step further, building what would become the region’s first public raptor center at Camp Greilick. On Thursday, the Grand Traverse County Parks and Recreation Commission voted unanimously Thursday to send a lease for a planned raptor center at Camp Greilick to the county Board of Commissioners. The planned facility would include a 5,000-square-foot education center and a dedicated bird-of-prey hospital. The new center is designed to centralize care that is currently scattered across private residential properties. The complex will feature a specialized hospital facility alongside an educational center connected to an interpretive trail, which will house non-releasable bird ambassadors for year-round community programming. The project comes as the group faces high community demand, having logged 700 rescue calls by September while operating out of three private residences. Demand for wildlife rehabilitation across Northern Michigan has grown beyond the capacity of home-based operations. Most licensed rehabilitators in the state
Grand Traverse County, MI · 10h
