Bird Related Trauma

A couple of weekends ago we had, what can only be described as a 'bird related trauma'. It was the day of the World Cup match between England and Portugal. I went out early in the morning to do my routine 'log run'. We have a good collection of flying fauna, who come back again and again for the food and water we leave out, not to mention several who rightly or wrongly believe that the garden is theirs. I suppose its as much theirs as it is ours and they do the sort of work protecting it that Mindy could only dream of. Or not. By now, they are very used to us, and a couple of blackbirds in particular hop around only feet from us as we sit or go about our business.

You get used to the different sounds they make, and what they mean. Today the blackbirds were up in the hedges making a very urgent 'chip chip chip!' noise, that they only usually make when a cat is near. I've seen them near enough attack a cat in our garden before, admittedly they never make actual contact, but here's certainly much 'running at' the cat in question, who is usually too busy providing Mindy with her next meaty snack to even notice. I should add at this stage that the usual chain of events in the event of a 'chip chip chip!' emergency, is for me to run at said cat whilst Mindy looks nonchalantly on. I can only imagine that she, and the local cats have come to some sort of agreement - you leave the snacks, I'll leave you alone. Anyway, nature has been clever, because in the larger scheme, the way that my, Mindy, the cat and the birds lives dovetails, is beautifully simple and yet majestical in its complexity. I believe this maybe what biologist cleverly refer to as an 'ecosystem'.

As I was coming to the end of my least favourite weekend chore, I spotted what I initially believed to be a particularly large and ovoid shit. It wasn't until I approached that I realised it was moving and that it was in fact a young, 'unflying' baby blackbird. It was also at that point that I realsied what all the commotion was about, today it wasn't about the cat, it was about me and the vulnerable baby. I quickly went inside, and got out of the way of the mother and her offspring. Helen and I watched for some time, from inside the house, hidden as well as we could. At one point I was even able to film the whole scene of the mother flying down with grubs and worms for the young one.


Unfortunately, it became increasingly apparent that this was all she was doing, hunting around the garden for food, flying over to the cheapping young 'un, and then....doing precisely nothing. The food was being presented, but somehow she wasn't actually depositing the food down into his hungry gob. This went on for some time and we decided to retire, just in case our presence, just out of eye and earshot, was causing some sort of problem for her.

We returned to the scene an hour or so later, and were dismayed to see that he had keeled over. I could see Mother, sitting in the tree's, apparently preening herself, so I went to check on him. He was still alive.

I am often torn in these situations, on the one hand the 'don't interfere, let nature take its course' side of my nature, is telling me that there is probably a solid reason for what it happening. Maybe the mother senses that something is wrong with the chick, who will not live anyway. On the flipside, the softer, compassionate side of me wants to get involved and do what I can. In the end, it was that side of me that won out, after all, humans are indeed part of nature too, and its only in my nature to get involved!

For the remaining hour, I had some success in reviving him with some water and small pieces of dog food (which I read were a good bet for young birds). He started to come around, and even started to cheap again a bit. Mindy wasn't the only one taking a keen interest in things, as when he started to cheap a little more, mother suddenly started to move in closer again. I was ready to leave him in her care, feeling I had done what I could, when he suddenly just died.

My guess would be that he was very weak, having had neither water of food for sometime, and just expired from lack of energy.

After I had buried him in the flower bed, Mindy' s final act of respect was to go to the worn spot in the grass where he had sat for so long and drop the biggest poop you had ever seen in the little hollow. Nature....Don't you love it?