Ojai Raptor Center is a fully functional and permitted rehabilitation center specializing in birds of prey. Every year, Ojai Raptor Center takes in roughly 1000 or more sick, injured or orphaned birds (including many non-raptor birds) with the hopes of rehabilitating them and releasing them back to the wild. Our four-acre campus includes a hospital and medical room, outdoor flight pens (with one of the largest in California), aviaries and mews. Beyond wildlife rehabilitation, our wildlife education programs advance our commitment to teaching the public about our local raptor species, and how human interaction affects them. Through wildlife education we hope to inspire people to learn more about birds of prey and how to protect them. We achieve wildlife education by providing educational programs with our raptor ambassadors — the non-releasable birds of prey who live at the center, and are trained to be ambassadors for their species. Many people will never get the chance to learn about birds of prey live and up close. We also take pride in teaching children. In order to reach more children, our educational programs are portable traveling to classrooms and other group settings. We hope that the next generation will have a love and respect for birds of prey, their important place in our ecosystem, and our shared environment. With our small staff and a large, committed network of volunteers, we have been doing this work since 2000. This important work is made possible through private funding sources in the form of donations and grants. We are a 501(c) nonprofit organization and do not receive sustained funding from government agencies; though we are permitted by both the California Department of Fish and Wildlife as well as the United States Fish and Wildlife Services.