More Birds!?

Why do these things always seem to happen to me?

As you know, my faithful blog readers, I have been the 'mother hen' to a family of pigeons for the past month and half. In early June, Mama and Papa Pigeon, Penny & Desmond, scouted out an empty planter on my back porch, and made it their home. Within a few days Penny laid an egg, three days later, she laid another egg.

For about 18 days, Pen & Des took turns sitting on those eggs morning and night, keeping them warm and safe. While I was away on vacation those two eggs hatched and out came Little Kevin and Baby Whitney, two of the cutest little baby pigeons I have ever seen!

After losing Honey, watching this little family grow has been good for me. Without Honey, one of the hardest parts of the day is turning the key in my front door lock, opening the door, and being greeted by a memory. The pigeon family has given me something to look forward to. Silly? Maybe—especially since many of you consider these creatures to only be flying rats, but they are quite fascinating and comforting to me.

Last Sunday, I began to worry the babies had been abandoned. I realized the mother hadn’t been around for a couple days, or at least I hadn’t seen her for a couple days. From my understanding, of the little research I did on pigeon rearing, the mother and father take care of the babies for at least 4-6 weeks. It had only been about one week. While I love this little family, I know I am not up for the task of taking care of two baby pigeons.

So, after taking a good look at them that night, and Monday morning, I figured the parents must be coming when I’m not looking because of two positive signs: one, the babies are growing fast; and two, they showed fight in them if I came too close.

Wait, I am getting off track, because this post really isn’t about Penny, Desmond, Kevin, or Whitney, but rather it’s about how such animals, helpless, sweet animals, especially birds, seem to land at my feet, requesting my help. Let me explain.

I leave for work this morning, out the back door—part of my ritual in checking on the family—and I see the mama is back, but this is not what I notice first. Nope. What I see first is a teeny, tiny baby bird squawking on the porch, inches from the family pigeon planter. What I see next is another teeny, tiny bird lying helpless in a nearby flowerpot. I immediately think “What the hell!?” Then, out of knowing that it seems to be my duty in dealing with these situations, I put down my purse, kick off my heels, and call work. “Yes I’ll be running late today.”

These damn birds are going to get me fired, I think. The one little guy is squawking its heart out, while the other one, in the planter, looks as though he’s at death’s door. And, I notice black crows high above licking their chops. I cannot bear this.

I go inside, get on the computer and type the words ‘bird help Chicago’ into Google and up comes the Chicago Bird Collision Monitors (773/988-1867). I call them and speak with Annette who turns out to be a life safer—literally—a bird life saver.

Annette and I talk about the situation. I tell her it appears as if they were just dumped on the porch. Annette asks about a nest and says if I can get them back in their nest, their mother will accept them and take care of them.

I start looking for a nest and see, in the rafters area, directly above my third story porch, is a small nook that is housing the nest; it’s impossible for me to get them back there. Annette says she can come and pick up these little guys so long as I can get them in a box and put them in a safe, warm area, preferably inside. I agree to the task.

I scoop up the babies and put them in a shoebox—one that normally houses a fantastic pair of red patent leather pumps. The little one from the porch is seriously squawking, while the one in the flowerpot doesn’t have much fight left. I am worried, but know help is on the way.

Once inside I run a hot shower to steam up the bathroom, and when sufficiently hot, I turn off the water and bring the birds in the room. They are not snuggling to each other so I give them each a tuft of toilet paper for comfort, tell them they will pull through this—words of encouragement can help!—and I shut the door. Twenty minutes later Annette arrives; I retrieve the babes and am happy to see the weaker of the two seems a tad bit stronger as he's making noise, and they are even snuggling a bit!

I bring them to Annette who tells me that are baby Starlings and certainly would have died had they just been left on the porch. She says what often happens is that there just isn’t enough room for all the babies in one nest so, sometimes, one or two will get accidentally knocked out of the nest. I’m not sure if these little guys will survive, but at least I know that they will not have a horrible death.

Now, going home tonight, I fear what I will find on my porch this evening? An injured crow? A giant owl, or maybe a Bald Eagle!!??

All I know, as sappy as this sounds, the only animals I want to find on my porch is Miss. Honey and sweet Xena.