Good Times, Bad Times

I think last week's epic snowy owl encounter was a bit of nature throwing me something good after a few bad things that I dealt with.

A squirrel showed up in our backyard with something very wrong with its tail.  A third of the tail, starting at the rear end and going out was bare.  The first part of that was white and crusty.  From beyond that it was all open, sore and bleeding heavily.  Initially when I saw him, I thought we had a mink in the yard because the tail was long and just dragged behind him.  There was no poofiness to the tail, no movement whatsoever, like it was a dead limb.  The rest of the squirrel appeared normal.  As we had a snowfall early one morning, then seeing him out there from a distance and then being able to follow his bloody track throughout the yard, I knew I had to do something.  I'm sure he was in pain and that tail looked really infected.

I called the Toronto Wildlife Centre and after leaving a message, someone called me back within an hour, and we had a conversation about the squirrel's condition.  Long story short, I could leave him out there and see what would happen.  Best case would be his tail falls off and if he didn't die from infection and blood loss, he would live a shortened life as they use their tails for many things from communicating, to helping them with some of those crazy jumps that they can do, to helping keeping themselves warm at night like a blanket.  This was all things that I never really thought about.  Then thinking back, I recall a few times over the years seeing a tailless squirrel in the yard and they never were around for very long.  I was "warned" that tail injuries most often end up in euthanasia.  This last bit of information threw me and I did debate on what to do.  As the squirrel continued to get around and leave a blood trail over the next day, I knew that catching him was the best thing.  It took 2 days and catching 8 others before him but I got him.  I plan on following up on him as I have his patient number but expect the outcome to be that he is no longer with us.

Then last Tuesday as I left work at 10 PM, I chanced upon an opossum along Britannia Rd in Mississauga.  He was wobbling along and the one side of his face was crimson red with blood.  It's obvious that he had been clipped by a car.  I quickly did a u-turn as soon as it was safely possible and went back for the animal.  I always have spare gloves in the back, a box or a carrier, sometimes both.  I watched as cars passed him, all narrowly missing him.  It was a harrowing thing to witness.  Again, once it was safe to do so, I raced out after the opossum, grabbing him and putting him in a box.  All I can say is "THE BLOOD!"  I had the intention on bringing him home for the night, and if he survived the night, I would take him to Toronto Wildlife.  Sadly he didn't even make it home with me, dying in the car before I got off the 401.  I needed some rocking me to sleep after that.

Normally I share pictures of the critters I blog about but you can understand why I did not here especially with the opossum.

Then, lastly, I have to share about my pigeon pal Lefty.  He showed up one afternoon on our front porch unable to fly.  I was just taking our cats to the vet when I saw him.  He was kinda jumping up at me, going around my feet, and I knew he wanted my attention.  He did distract me for a moment while I was getting the cats in the car.  I walked after him and he got on my hand as I knelt down to him.  I know I said something to him and put him back on our porch, probably said something like "I have to take Merry and Molly to the vet, you wait here".  Like he was going to understand me.  HA!  But don't all of us animal people talk to our furry and feathered friends like they know what we are saying?

I was gone about an hour and when I got home, Lefty was no where to be seen.  I had heard about him some more from Angie and our neighbours as he was walking around the area.  Everyone knew something was wrong with him.  But where did he go?  It was late in the afternoon and I went out every 45 minutes or so until dark, seeing if I could spot him again.  No luck.

The next morning Lefty shows up again.  He comes walking up the side of the house and out into the backyard.  I hold my hand out and he cannot fly up to me.  I kneel down, hold my hand out again maybe 6 inches from the ground and he jumps up into it.  "Aw dude, what's wrong?"  I gave him some food and he ate.  It wasn't a piggish feed like he and any of the other pigeons normally do which added to my concern about his health.  He sat there on my fingers, poofed out...  that was another sign something was wrong with him.

I put him in my carrier and called Toronto Wildlife.  As per norm, about an hour later someone returned my call.  We had a brief chat about Lefty and I had to answer the usual questions like if the bird had any bands, if it was a baby, etc.  I explained how I knew this pigeon as he was one of my regulars, more or less.  He has been coming around since last summer sometime.  He did disappear for a few months late in the fall and just started coming around again in the last few weeks.  So ya, not a baby, not a banded pet pigeon.  I got the approval to bring him in and away we went.

Normally with any animals I bring into the centre, I cover them up and keep things quiet.  Lefty was a different story.  I hate to say that he was almost like a pet to me because he is not that, but most of you get at what I mean.  My retelling of him coming to me for help, at least that is how I took it, says that while he is a wild bird, there's something different with him like some of the others that I have gotten to know over the years.  I talked to him a little here and there with the drive up to the centre.  Lefty just sat there in the carrier and looked at me the whole time.  I told him he was going to get help, they would look after him, everything would be okay.  Again, here I am thinking Lefty understood everything I said to him, word for word.  I honestly believe that he did, in his own way.  He knew I was his friend.  He sought me out when he was in trouble.  Any bird that cannot fly besides penguins as an example, is a doomed bird, especially here in a city with so many animal predators and free roaming cats.

It was hard to pass Lefty over to the staff and see him get taken away to the back, still in the carrier.  But I left Toronto Wildlife with hopes that we would see each other again.  Sadly that was not to be.

It was deemed that Lefty had a viral infection called PMV.  There is no cure.  He would only get worse over time and I have seen that in other birds.  It wouldn't be long until he would turn into a seemingly drunk bird and stumble around and fall on his face.  Then in the last stages, he would start to have violent convulsions and this would carry on for who knows how long until he finally passed.  I have seen this in other birds.  Euthanasia was the only option here.  His suffering ended.

Losing Lefty was like losing another friend.  He showed up in the yard last summer and quickly took to me.  We had a lot of fun last year over the months and he was a little blessing while I was off sick those 10 weeks.  

Then Halloween came around and he obliged my selfies with him.  Some of the pigeons get pretty freaked out at my masks, not Lefty though.

He was an awesome little backyard friend.  He is proof to the people that pigeons really are personable birds.  Just be kind to them and you will get the love in return.

I'm missing him and will for a long time.  Thanks for friendship Lefty.

Most of my bird pals just fly away one day and do not come back.  I don't know what happened to them and don't put much thought into that.  I have mixed emotions about situations like this where I know their outcome; and I try to keep the knowing he's not suffering and died with some dignity at the forefront. 

I think about making a pigeon book of all my friends over the years.  I don't know how often I would look at it.  I see their photos come up on my Facebook memories and much like the many of Meadow over the years, there's days the pictures put a smile on my face while some days I get overwhelmed with sadness as I miss her, and some of these birds who used to come visit me daily.

Okay, that's it for this one.  See you all again soon as I have my next blog already working through my mind, just compiling the photos for it.