I Captured the Bird of Peace

Yes, I did. So here's how it happens. After I get off of work at 5ish I let my cats roam around in the yard for an hour or so. Thursday a week ago when I went out there I found an injured dove in the yard. I immediately get the cats to leave him alone - not that they could even CATCH the injured dove that can't fly, I mean, it's not as if they are hunters or anything - I grabbed up the dove & put him in a shoe box. Then I called Patrick. Let me get a few things straight right off the bat. Patrick grew up in a VERY animal friendly home. My in laws are huge animal rights activists to the point that the MIL captures spiders & lets them go outside. I grew up on a farm with cows - and not the dairy kind. All of the men in my family are hunters & hunting season equals fresh deer in the freezer. Our views of the roles of animals in the world differ quite a bit. As I have grown older I have become much more open hearted to animals, but I'm still a realist - if you know what I mean. So if you are a PETA person, I don't want to hear crap about my comments - as you'll see I'm too animal soft hearted for my own good. Ok now...back to the story. I tell Patrick of the dove & he said he'd deal with it when he got home (duh). He calls me on his way home & we have the following conversation:
Him: I looked up injured dove on the internet & we have a few choices
Me: Yeah?
Him: Yeah. First of all, it says it depends on what kind of person you are.
Me: {holding my breath & kind of hoping we are the kind of people that knock an injured dove in the head but instead say} So what kind of people are we?
Him: Well, we can wrap it's wing with an ace bandage & keep it for a few weeks & then it SHOULD be able to fly, then we let it go.
Me: {immediatley wondering when the dove still can't fly in a couple of weeks who will knock it in the head} hmmmm, ok, then that's what we'll do.

This requires a cage, which we happen to have since we didn't have very good luck with the hamsters. (oh yeah, remembering that the cats CAN hunt - well, a caged animal anyway). We keep the dove. We wonder what birds eat & the feel immediately stupid when we realize the answer - bird seed - duh. We wrap the dove as per the instruction on the web site (which I can't find right this second).



So we are doing the right thing, right? Who the hell knows. We know nothing about birds. Or doves. or injured doves. Quite honestly the dove doesn't seem overly grateful that we rescued it....I think he feels that we birdnapped him. Of course we did immediately put him in a little birdy straight jacket & we do have cats so I'm sure he figures he's lunch. Saturday morning we wake up & he has escaped the straight jacket. I have no idea how. Whatever, we wrap him up again.

Saturday we were both gone all day. Patrick goes to the pet store to get it some toys to keep it busy. Because really, I mean, the dove had toys in the wild, right? (insert eye roll here) The pet store girl basically tells us that the dove is one of the stupidest animals alive & that if we stuffed a wire ball with grass it will spend it's days taking the grass out of the ball. Geeze. Good thing we got it a toy. Maybe it's not thinking ANYTHING after all. Patrick goes to get the cage to put said toy in there & low & behold we see this:


Do you see it (right there under the piece of green grass)? It's a FUCKING EGG. The bird laid an egg. At this point I am totally speechless & if you know me at all you understand the severity of this statement. Really, I just don't know what to say about the bird we save from certain death & wrapped up in ace bandages laying an egg. I shake my head in disbelief for the rest of the day. The phrase "No good deed shall go unpunished" keeps coming to mind.

We tell this story to the FIL at lunch on Sunday. He knows a lady that takes care of injured birds! Oh man, that is the best news I ever heard. We drop the dove off at her house. We ask her if she wants the egg. She looks at us like we are crazy. Seems that the bird lady is a realist too. I have had people that said they couldn't have left the bird there if she didn't take the egg too. To those people all I have to say is this - I know where you can go to get an injured bird.....Just saying.