North Las Vegas residents give back to community in variety of ways

Working on the farm

Need advice on nursing a sick chicken back to health? Ask 12-year-old Dylan Brown, who has wanted to be a veterinarian since she was 3, according to her mother, Danyel.

Dylan has volunteered at Sharon and Glenn Linsenbardt’s Farm and Barn Buddies Rescue, 7222 W. Grand Teton Drive, for the last two and a half years. Danyel, Dylan’s father David and 6-year-old brother Drew volunteer with her.

“Whatever the passion is for the person in our family, we try to be a family unit and rally around that person, and support that passion,” Danyel said.

The Browns spend every Saturday and Sunday just a few minutes away from home, at the farm. It features’ rescued barn cats, horses, rabbits, pot-bellied pigs, fresh eggs, produce and raw local honey, with cackling birds singing backup.

The Browns have also helped feed the animals every night since February.

One beneficiary from that is Mr. Kitty, a chicken that fell ill at the farm last year with avian pox. After receiving a death sentence from the veterinarian, she went home with the Browns to die. But thanks to medication, love and essential oils in a diffuser, Mr. Kitty flapped back into action .

Putting a dropper in a beak is a useful skill, according to Dylan, who competes in chicken showmanship in 4-H Club, a youth development organization.

“She’s learned something from Sharon that you can’t pay for,” Danyel said.

Sharon Linsenbardt has spent half a century on the farm watching kids learn more and bonding with parents when they volunteer as a unit.

“They gotta keep coming back and teaching kids about giving back to the community,” Linsenbardt said. “Giving to something that’s special.”

Among Linsenbardt’s volunteers during the recent, pumpkin-studded Farm Fall Festival: Sisters Brisa and Geneva Tenney volunteer with their father, Tim. On their second day at the Farm, Tim helped oversee the kiddy train. The girls looked after pigs and cleaned the goat house, where May the goat pooped, and pooped again.

The sisters are pursuing 120 volunteer hours for an extra credit at Arbor View High School. They’re also members of Key Club International, a Kiwanis International-sponsored organization that encourages local high schoolers to develop leadership skills through volunteering.

“It’s a special time for us,” Tim said. “The bonding. As far as volunteering, it’s just taking the first step. Just helping out in the community makes you feel like you belong.

Digging up fossils

Those who prefer ice age camelops and Porsche-sized sloths — but don’t want to clean up after them — can track the footsteps of 14-year-old Nicola Talbot and her father, Jonathan, across the landscape of Tule Springs Fossil Beds National Monument in North Las Vegas.

Through Protectors of Tule Springs, the father-daughter duo helps keep the place clean and tags along with expert paleontologists.

“I loved dinosaurs as a kid,” Jonathan said.

Then, Nicola inspired him to dig into paleontology. As a student at Arbor View High, she hoped to join the National Junior Honor Society, but lacked volunteer hours.

“I like getting dirty,” she said. “Finding fossils, the mathematics, solving the puzzle.”

She hopes to make paleontology her career in some fashion.

She’s also looking forward to showing her future kids one day where she and her father worked together to conserve an ice age fossil bed.

Feeding the seniors

For the Bartis, a family that’s delivered food to seniors through Helping Hands of Vegas Valley, 2320 Paseo Del Prado, since January 2011, finding volunteer work that even welcomed children was a challenge. But her three kids soon took over, said Bonnie Barti.

When one senior’s cocker spaniel had medical problems, daughter Hannah found someone to make a dog wheelchair for free.

“I learned to respect people, even though their situation may not be the same as mine,” said Hannah, 16.

She also learned about loss. A senior she cared about on the route died of cancer while she was on a class trip in Washington D.C.

The family still does the route every first and third Saturday. Hannah’s retired grandparents have now joined them, taking their own route.

Generations are bridged at the farm, as well. But reaping rewards takes more than a few family volunteer outings.