This student toiled in aviaries, barns and pens for his co-op
He shoveled goat poop for science
Few people can say that they shoveled goat poop for science.
Aidan Doherty is one of them. An incoming junior at Northeastern University from Lowell, Massachusetts, he spent his six-month co-op cleaning up animal barns, making hard-boiled eggs for opossums, and taking an old turkey vulture named Orvo for a walk in the sun twice a day.
He said he loved the time he spent on the 291-acre Massachusetts Audubon Society’s Drumlin Farm Wildlife Sanctuary in the metro-Boston town of Lincoln, even when a wild wood duck named Frank would charge at him, waddling fast to gnaw on the toe of his shoe with its bill full of fury.
The duck attack in the aviary “was a daily thing,” Doherty, 20, said. “It didn’t hurt. The duck just thinks he’s a lot bigger than he is.”
Doherty’s coop was part of his environmental science work toward a bachelor of science degree in environmental and sustainability sciences from Northeastern.
He hopes his stint as a wildlife care technician will help enhance his studies and propel him into a career protecting animals and wildlife habitat.
In addition to being a safe place where even permanently injured animals can live out their lives in safety, Drumlin Farm is a popular stop for tourists and school field trips where people can learn more about animals, their living space and sustainable agriculture.
Meg Stone, his supervisor at Drumlin Farm, said that Doherty is a natural at working with the animals, such was the care he showed Orvo, the turkey vulture [named for the famed Wright Brother Orville], who can no longer fly because of a calcified old wing.
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Doherty learned how to safely handle the animal and respect its space – a skill that isn’t easy to master,” Stone said.
“Aidan has great passion,” said Stone, adding that his experience was enhanced by the opportunity he had to get up close and personal with wildlife for an extended period of time.
‘What makes that important is …he can put a face on nature,” Stone said. “It’s like putting a face to the name of someone you’ve met in real life. That fuels a better passion.”
The degree Doherty is working on is designed to provide students with skills needed to tackle the pressing ecological problems of today, said associate professor Katie Lotterhos, who teaches environmental science. These include climate change, deforestation and human development encroaching on the wild biome.
“He was great in class,” Lotterhos said. “He had great energy, worked well with people, and I feel he grasped difficult concepts.”
He was doing the groundwork needed for deeper environmental conservation studies, she said.
Doherty said he picked Northeastern in part because of its co-op programs.
As well as working with wildlife, he said he’d like to work as a policy advisor or environmental lobbyist to help lawmakers write better regulations and laws that protect wild habitat.
At Northeastern, Doherty also participated in HEAT – the Husky Environmental Action Team, a student organization that focuses on sustainability and environmental issues. He helped host events to educate fellow students about environmental sustainability such as cutting down on the use of plastics, or collecting food waste to be used as compost instead of going to landfills.
He said even little things such as helping to reduce the need for land-consuming trash dumps can help wildlife retain more places to live.
“I’m trying to protect animals,” Doherty said. “We need the animals in the world.”
He explained that animals are bellwether to how our environment is doing, crucial for human survival. And environmentally sensitive creatures such as bees provide people with much of the food supply through pollination. He said that indiscriminate logging for wood and building houses that encroach upon wild territory puts humans first without any consideration for animals.
“Animals have every right to be in the world, to have their habitats undisturbed,” Doherty said. “They have every right that we have to live.”
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