Dr.Chris Ridley was the first person in Manitoba to start a game farm and sanctuary.Ridley operated his Birdwarren Sanctuary for more than fifty years.It was located along the Assiniboine River on Empire Street in Headingley from the mid 1960s until 1975.At that time he moved the Sanctuary to Argyle because Headingley was incorporated into the City of Winnipeg,and expansion and higher taxes made the move necessary.Over the years he moved from Argyle to Lockport and finally St.Laurent in 1991. Dr.Ridley held a PhD in Zoology from the University of
Manitoba and had been caring for injured animals ever since he set up the first sanctuary in the Norwood area of St. Boniface in the 1920s.He continued to operate this project entirely with private donations.He has banded migrating birds longer than anyone else in Canada.

Through the years,Dr.Ridley showed thousands of school children Sammie the Toucan,Izzy the Pelican,and his bald eagle,along with countless blue jays,owls,hawks,great blue herons,crows,rabbits and even monkeys.Every spring Dr. Ridley held a show at Polo Park where he moved part of his sanctuary.

During the Headingley years there were hundreds of animals at the popular sanctuary.They included Japanese deer, cougars,coyotes,raccoons,chinchilla,a bald eagle,hawks,llamas,owls,pelicans,a toucan,Canada and Snow geese,peacocks,monkeys,pheasants,budgies and more.Everyone from game wardens,zoo caretakers to private citizens came seeking
his assistance for tropical pets or birds in need of surgery. These accounted for the thousands of animals that Dr.Ridley cared for and returned to the wilderness once medical care was completed.

Chris charged a nominal $5 fee;however,most people dropped $20-30 into the donation box.Ridley was kept busy answering treatment inquiries from across Canada,caring for U of M lab animals,along with frequent appearances on TV and radio shows.Mike Kitchen eventually became Chris Ridley ’s successor.Kitchen was only 14 when he first started volunteering at the Headingley Sanctuary. Ridley proved to be a resourceful patient himself over the years.He once had a coyote bite his top lip,so to hide the scar, he grew a moustache.Another time during a photo shoot he took 18 stitches to his arm when Tonka,his grown cougar, lunged at a duck he was holding.He drove himself to the hospital.

Dr.Ridley died on March 31,2003 at Tuxedo Villa.He was 93 years of age.