For the past four or five days, I've noticed a pigeon hanging around near the side door of my apartment building. It appears to be fine -- bright eyes, plump, no obvious/visible signs of injury -- but it never flies away when you approach it; it just waddles off.
I was in my usual pet food store buying cat supplies and thought I would look for some pigeon food (somebody had put out bread but of course that is NOT good for birds). The staff member I was talking to advised me to call a local bird rescue group before I bought anything and get their advice.
Their advice? "Yes, that is definitely not normal behaviour. Can you catch it?"
Um ...
The rescue organization gave me three drop-off points for the pigeon (the actual organization is in the next town) and I decided to use the Humane Society.
So out I go with a towel (plus my purse plus my iPad with directions to the HS). I had a pet carrier in my car that wasn't in good shape but would be fine for a *maybe* five-ounce bird.
Did I mention I have NEVER handled birds before?
So there I am, holding the towel and shifting from one foot to another, trying to figure out how to do this (I was afraid I would grab the bird too hard and thus complicate matters) when, thankfully, another building resident who'd come out for a smoke said "I used to raise pigeons ..."
Me: "REALLY??" 😍
So he goes *scoop* and he's got the pigeon and then he tucks it into the pet carrier. Took him maybe 2 seconds. If it had been me, I'd still have been doing my "dances with pigeons" routine 15 or 20 minutes later.
I managed to find the Humane Society (that's a story in itself) and explained what I was doing, and when I left they were calling the rescue organization to get their driver to come back (he'd only just left ...) and pick up the pigeon.
So at least the pigeon is now in competent hands (i.e. not mine ). TBH, I'm amazed that none of the neighbourhood cats had got it yet.
I'm just very glad nobody was there taking videos of my "rescue" attempt.
I was in my usual pet food store buying cat supplies and thought I would look for some pigeon food (somebody had put out bread but of course that is NOT good for birds). The staff member I was talking to advised me to call a local bird rescue group before I bought anything and get their advice.
Their advice? "Yes, that is definitely not normal behaviour. Can you catch it?"
Um ...
The rescue organization gave me three drop-off points for the pigeon (the actual organization is in the next town) and I decided to use the Humane Society.
So out I go with a towel (plus my purse plus my iPad with directions to the HS). I had a pet carrier in my car that wasn't in good shape but would be fine for a *maybe* five-ounce bird.
Did I mention I have NEVER handled birds before?
So there I am, holding the towel and shifting from one foot to another, trying to figure out how to do this (I was afraid I would grab the bird too hard and thus complicate matters) when, thankfully, another building resident who'd come out for a smoke said "I used to raise pigeons ..."
Me: "REALLY??" 😍
So he goes *scoop* and he's got the pigeon and then he tucks it into the pet carrier. Took him maybe 2 seconds. If it had been me, I'd still have been doing my "dances with pigeons" routine 15 or 20 minutes later.
I managed to find the Humane Society (that's a story in itself) and explained what I was doing, and when I left they were calling the rescue organization to get their driver to come back (he'd only just left ...) and pick up the pigeon.
So at least the pigeon is now in competent hands (i.e. not mine ). TBH, I'm amazed that none of the neighbourhood cats had got it yet.
I'm just very glad nobody was there taking videos of my "rescue" attempt.
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