My SOS mission for this morning….
This dear young jackdaw had been found in the courtyard last night. After I removed my cats from the vicinity – no mean feat, he disappeared into a tiny gap between the garden wall and the house. Poor little fledgling had no chance now he was on the ground. I couldn’t retrieve him and knew that when he emerged the cats would be waiting. It’s a very cat heavy street.
After midnight I had a call out to a patient and whilst on the phone I could hear all this flapping outside. As predicted he had ventured out and was being watched with deadly intent. I scooped him up into a box and into a nice quiet room overnight.
This morning we took him to Devon Wildlife Hospital which we are lucky enough to have on our doorstep (amazing, hardworking people). He was one of many young jackdaws and magpies to have been rescued, all to be fed up and made strong for release as soon as possible. I know that you should really leave young birds and that they will find their way back to the mother, but to do so would have meant certain death in his case, he wouldn’t even have made it over the wall. I felt a bit better about interfering when I was told that he was very underweight and probably hadn’t been looked after properly. Other than that there were no injuries apart from a couple of scuffs and some missing feathers.
Hopefully he will be flying free in no time.
what a sweet little bird. i'm glad you intervened and rescued him.
Posted by: melissa | June 10, 2009 at 14:40
god - well done on rescuing him (and great shot of that amazing blue eye)
Posted by: annieb | June 10, 2009 at 23:15
Well done you! He is such a sweetie! x
Posted by: Hannah | June 11, 2009 at 15:29
sometimes you just have to intervene - I would have done exactly the same --
Posted by: periwinkle | June 12, 2009 at 13:28