****No Date Wild Birds in the HomeOriginal Sunday Review Sketch by Dennis Puleston, Brookhaven
Most of the readers of the Sunday Review are familiar with
Mrs Norval Dwyer, our guest writer today. She writes on a topic
that will be familiar to most of you, for the situation of disabled
birds in and about the home is a common one. --ps
WILD BIRDS IN THE HOME
by Norval Dwyer
Many mothers reading this column will have had the
experience of patiently providing numberless empty match
boxes or cookie cartons to serve as coffins for little birds
found dead or dying around the yard in spring or summer.
And if they are mothers of little children, they' have
probably had to attend elaborate burial services under some
tree or bush, afterwards explaining as best as they can, the
great mystery of Death. Never let it be said that Susie's or
Jimmie's or Sally's mother callously threw a dead bird in the
trash can! Not, at east, if Susie, Jimmie or Sally are under
the age of seven or eight.
Most wild birds do not take
readily to captivity. Once, in the
w i n c e r, we found a handsome
male blue jay who had the flight
feather of one wing clawed off
by a cat. We brought him in the
house and put him in a large
cage. He ate what we gave him,
drank his water regularly, pecked
at the wooden perches,. and in
general, was very lively. When we
let him out on the floor for exer-
cise, he hopped about vigorously,
using his injured wing just like
a crutch.
Whenever he heard the blue
lays outdoors, he would answer
back in an eager, confident tone,
as if to assure them that he
would soon join them. He seemed
to like the timbre of my voice;
and whenever I spoke to him, he
would answer with a short, warb-
ly, soft call, very different from
the shrill call of the jay outdoors
as he flies from• tree to tree.
This jay, seemed as contented
as a jay could be; but one morn-
ing, three weeks after we had
brought him in the house, we
found him dead.' His death was
a mystery which we could not
solve.
Later, in the spring, we found
a newborn baby bird, featherless
and ugly, on the ground under a
tree. We brought it in the house,
settled it in an abandoned bird
nest and fed it cooked hamburg.
For a few days it thrived, and
rapidly grew in size and feathers
until we recognized the markings
on it of a cat bird.
The little bird was lively and
healthy, and he seemed to be
following his normal pattern of-
life: For instance, it was his habit
to stand on the edge of the nest
to' leave his droppings, which
Nature had neatly encased in a
kind of membrane which could
be tossed over the side, leaving
the nest clean.
As he got older, the little cat
bird was- able to flutter out of
the nest to the floor. Then he
would flap his stubby wings and
hop from the nest to our shoulder
or arm. He had no fear of us.
But gradually he seemed to lose
his appetite, no matter what we
tried to give him to eat; and
whenever he was awake he cried
and called incessantly. One day I
gave him a bit of raw apple, and
that apparently fatally upset his
digestion.
How that small bird tried to hold
on to his life! How he willed to
live! Each morning when we went
to the nest we expected to find
him dead, but he would be feebly
calling and trying to get to his
feet. He lingered two or, three
days like this, and before we
could locate a bird expert to tell
us what to do, 'he finally died.
Friends of ours recently found
a full grown male hummingbird
which apparently had become ex-
hausted from a long migration
flight. They put it in a cage, and
they are feeding it with •a medi-
cine dropper full of honey and
water. The tiny bird .thrusts his
needle -like bill up the tube of the
dropper and extends his thread-
like, tongue into the nectar. And
still, our friends . say, he does not
seem to recover his full vitality.
Is the gap between the world
of the wild bird and the world
of humans too broad to span? Or
is a bridge of communication pos-
sible? Saint Francis D'Assissi is
said to have found such a bridge.
Did he not preach to the birds
and call them his "brothers "?