Being a bird Rehabber, able to rescue and return to the wild a sick or injured bird, can be extremely rewarding. However, the opposite can also be heart breaking.
Yesterday was a real downer for me when I discovered Angie the injured wood pigeon dead in the aviary. I had been treating her for the past 5 weeks and she was flying and progressing well.
She had been killed in the aviary by a Sparrowhawk who had also killed and taken Bluey, a feral pigeon with a broken wing that I had kept safe for the past 3 years.
Incredibly the Sparrowhawk had entered the Aviary by getting between overlapping wooden Slats that were barely an inch and half apart. It was able to kill and take Bluey from the floor of the aviary up and out through the slats, leaving only a trail of feathers showing the route.
I have 2 aviaries which are only used for sick, injured, or orphaned birds. Disco the Mallard duck with a broken wing uses one of them and has been shaken up by the experience. She would have witnessed the Sparrowhawk killing both Pigeons and has been reluctant to leave her aviary ever since.
The Sparrowhawk has gotten into one of the aviary's before, when the door was open and there were no occupants, witness the Photo I took before it was able to escape.
This time of year always seems to favour the Sparrowhawks, as the leaves disappear and expose plenty of targets for them.
Having fixed Angie's broken wing successfully I am particularly vexed at her sad and premature demise.
2 comments:
How upsetting, Joe, I know how you feel. One of our cygnets swallowed a fisherman’s hook, line and float. I caught her and took her 90 miles to the Yorkshire Swan and Wildlife Rescue Hospital where an operation successfully removed the offending material. She made a good recovery and was given a long lasting antibiotic injection so I could pick her up and return her to the family. She was received with joy and lived happily on the canal for three weeks. Then she drowned in a freak accident, having got her head stuck in a crack in the canal bank. She must have been foraging under the water and didn’t realise that she needed to move her head down to remove it. A similar accident happened to a cygnet last year and the council were supposed to repair the canal bank but nothing happened. My friend, Di and I have now wedged a piece of wood into the fissure in the bank so hopefully this tragedy will not happen again. It is devastating when you lose a creature you have saved and cared for. Best wishes, Wendy x
Hi Wendy, That was a horrendous accident you describe, really very upsetting for you. Interesting you mention the council not repairing the canal bank as we might have trouble with our riverbank soon, due to trees being allowed to grow out of control on the river wall. This is liable to cause the river walls to crack open when we have severe winter weather. Council cutbacks mean lack of maintenance which will cost more in the long run....and potential accidents too.
Keep up the good work, Take care Joe x
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