Originally published at Joely Sue Burkhart. You can comment here or there.
It wasn’t exactly midnight…but around 11:30 p.m. last night we had a rescue mission.
Just as I was getting ready to go to bed, Princess Monster (she was allowed to stay up extra late since school is out. She *loves* staying up late by herself. I have no idea who she gets that from. *innocent look*) took the dog out for me and came rushing back inside.
“MOM, there’s a hurt bird outside! We have to help it!”
I’ll admit, even after seeing the little creature, I wasn’t sure what we coud do for it. When she’d first seen it, the bird was lively enough to hop around that at first she thought it was a frog, but it couldn’t fly. I didn’t personally see it with wings beating or anything, so I don’t know if it got hit by a car and a wing is broken or what happened. I hesitated to try and catch it, especially so late, with all the craziness going on as it is…
“Mom, remember the song about the nightingale?”
Oh, this monster knows exactly how to manipulate me. She reminded me of the Christmas song about the hurt nightingale which becomes Maria’s offering to baby Jesus. On the right day, it can make me cry. So I sent her inside for an old towel. While she was looking for a box (you wouldn’t think that would be so hard since we’re moving, but I’d used up nearly all the boxes I had!), I easily caught the bird in the towel. He didn’t even try to hop or fly — probably petrified to death.
I ended up using one of my larger boxes and carefully set him inside, towel and all. We got a little dish of water in case he was thirsty. The little guy made it through the night, and the two youngest monsters are enthralled with the little bird. Later today I’ll call our local conservation office and see what they recommend we do with him.
Here’s a picture of the little guy. I have no idea what kind of bird he is.
ETA: I talked to the conversation office and they recommended setting him outside beneath a towel to see if he was merely in shock. Once he recovered, he would simply hop out and fly away. I went out to the garage (with an eager troop of monsters) with another towel, opened the box, and the little bugger hopped/flapped out. Chaos ensued. We opened the garage door, and with just a little gentle shooing, little birdie flew out and across the street to our neighbor’s yard.
Yay! I think he’s recovered.
Of course, Littlest Monster had gone outside barefoot and stepped in the bird’s departing gift of poo on the garage floor.
Wailing ensued…