(Header image made with microsoft co-pilot)
This blog reflects my personal experiences and opinions and does not represent or reflect those of DierenAmbulance Nederrijn.
It’s been a long break from animal rescuing as I’ve had a fortnight’s holiday. “Sally”, my regular driver, asked if I “…had zin in” (= Dutch for a strong version of “Do I feel like it?”) to be back at the ambulance.
Of course! It’s good to be back in the thick of it again!
In the thick of it
I was happy there were things to do as soon as I arrived on site. In fact we’re now operating on 2 parallel shifts again to deal with the high work load – and there’s a new influx of volunteers who need to be worked in. Sally and I happened to be “Team 1” which means we’re the ‘main’ team and are the first port of call to carry out the rescues; the overflow falls to Team 2. One of the tasks is having a Paddy with us.
I pushed to get out and get cracking with our rescues quickly. There’s no point in hanging around when there are animals in need.
Sally and I love the working relationship we have with each other, and whilst we see the value of training up new volunteers, it’s an effort (and a squeeze in the ambulance) to have one riding along with us in the sense of an interruption to our workflow. Today we were planned in for a Paddy, but he wasn’t here yet. If we had left 1 minute sooner he would have ridden with Team 2…
Emergency: Brown bird
We had 2 rescues so I determined the best order to carry them out, ensuring minimal time in transport for each when we brought them to the wildlife rescue centre. A 3rd rescue came in on the way to the way to the first rescue. It was for a “brown bird” who’d flown into a window and was nearly dead. The finder thought the poor creature was going to die soon so the rescue had been marked up as an emergency.
This bird was way off route, but I was keen to rescue him first, bring him to the rescue centre, then head off out again for the first 2 rescues. But the wait times would be long for those birds too.
More people means more discussion which doesn’t always mean more or better solutions. I opted to call the centralist. During the call the brown bird’s rescue had been taken off our list. Thankfully not because he’d already died, but because the other ambulance was sent out to pick him up. Perfect solution!
Cat Attack: 2 baby birds.
A sad story as always. We were advised that one of them had blood on his wing and body; both were in a box with a hot water bottle.
The open box they were in was kept in a high location, out of reach of a small dog. And a large dog. The cat, looking more aggrieved than guilty, peered inside from the garden into the lounge through the closed patio door glass. The finder handed the box to me and I had my first glimpse of these 2 nestlings. Although they were marked as pigeons, I really couldn’t tell!
The finder pointed out the blood though I must confess I couldn’t see it easily. The open wound was horribly clear. The other bird – presumably a sibling – was in a really bad way. He lay on his side motionless except for his mouth which opened and closed like he was gagging. Or hoping for some help in the form of food.
Sally had the rescue box handy and asked the finder to fill our own hot water bottle with hot water. Some water needed to be let out; too much and the bottle is too round and the birds would roll off of it when it beds the rescue box.
Back inside the ambulance (with closed doors because you never know…) we put each bird into a small nest for extra stability during transportation to the wildlife rescue centre.
I wanted to bring the babies there as quickly as possible, but we had a stop to make first.
Small black bird with a broken leg
I’m not sure what the background behind this bird is, but she couldn’t fly away. The finder tried giving her some food which she didn’t want, and eventually put a washing basked over her so we could retrieve her and bring her to the wildlife rescue centre.
We were lead on arrival to the balcony where we saw the tall basket over the bird and heard her agitated flapping. Sally and I noticed straight away this wasn’t a small, black bird, but a medium-sized pigeon!
The basket was near a wall so access was tricky in the cramped conditions; I was grateful Sally was nearest to me because I trusted her – either to lift the basket up carefully as I grab the pigeon, or vice versa. One small mistake here and the bird might be over the balcony wall and of course that wouldn’t be good as she can’t fly. I didn’t want to take that risk with Paddy; thankfully he hovered somewhere with the magazine I’d asked him to hold.
Sally tilted the basket carefully so I could reach underneath and grab the pigeon. It was very difficult to get hold of her wings. I usually do this with birds because this is their ‘pain neutral’ position (so I’ve heard) and it also stops them flapping and moving about. But now I couldn’t – because she flapped and moved about! I did get hold of her body though, and was surprised at how small this was.
Aside: I suppose the corollary is that the wings are big, which now I come to think of it, makes sense because pigeons are heavy in relation to their wing size and sit on the limit of the body-weight to wing size ratio that’s used for flight.
For example, the size wing that is required to lift the weight of a human body is so large that our muscles simply aren’t strong enough to lift the wings. Most small birds are light enough that they only need small wings ti lift their body weight – small enough that they can easily be moved to power their flight.
Pigeons are somewhere in between. They need strong muscles to move their wings which are only just big enough to allow them to fly. This is why we hear pigeons flapping so much; they need to extend their wings so far over their backs to allow them to take off, that they hit each other. This is what we hear!
Once I had a hold of the body I worked my hands to get the wings folded in and held against the body one at a time, all the while staying under the washing basket in case I fumbled and lost the pigeon. Thankfully this didn’t happen and I could move the pigeon into the rescue box behind me.
The pigeon wasn’t happy – and neither was I. Placing a bird into a box is simple; place the bird in the box (that can’t be dumbed down any more…) and ask the driver / paddy to close the lid whilst I’m still holding the bird. Paddy was closest, but let’s just say Sally needed to leapfrog over the tall washing basket and past me so she could reach the box and help me.
In the kerfuffle I wasn’t able to check the condition of the broken leg.
Three prods to Paddy for him to hand over the magazine to the finder, and we were off.
Wildlife Rescue Centre Collection
Now there’s no need to call the rescue centre ahead, I’m not sure how they know when an animal will be brought there and when to check the cupboards for the injured animals we bring in.
The theory is they receive an email of my rescue report so they expect a ‘delivery’. But the email needs to be seen and read and our arrival time calculated from our location. It sounds tenuous. I took it on myself to make a note of our expected arrival in my reports.
This was easy for the pigeon. I hadn’t done it for the baby birds because I knew our route to the centre wasn’t direct. Once on our way, we phoned them to ask whether the babies needed to be put inside a cupboard with an incubator. This wasn’t needed because the babies had feathers and weren’t bald. I wasn’t sure if I was happy about this, but at least they had our hot water bottle, and in theory they were going to be collected soon after we dropped them off.
I made sure I let them know on the phone our expected time of arrival.
After the 2 baby pigeons and the older pigeon were safely in the cupboards at the rescue centre, we went to the side of the building where we could retrieve some of our equipment. These things are, for example, hot water bottles which stay with the rescue boxes when we bring in the animals. The rescue centre clearns them and returns them to a container outside where we’re able to pick them up.
Hen loose in garden
A call came in back at the base about a hen that was loose in someone’s garden. Could we come and catch it?
Sadly (for me personally, and for the caller), no we wouldn’t. The policy is only collecting animals that have already been captured. (Thus making us more of a transport service than rescuers…)
Paddy
I’ll take some space here for a section about Paddy. Not a rant (that would be too easy), but about how I dealt with the things I’d rant about if I were going to rant.
Today was my 3rd shift with this Paddy, showing him things and explaining him things, and I hope making a good distinction between protocol and my personal tips. And he’s had at least 3 other shifts with other volunteers. The guy’s lack of initiative or motivation to do things is infuriating, but as I’ve learned, I need to change how I act rather than changing him.
As I realised on my last shift, I like to be in control, but I can’t lead, so my approach today was asking / telling him to do things.
Generally speaking this seemed to work because it meant I knew what he was up to, and if not I told him what he should be up to. And it made me more relaxed. The flip side was sometimes I felt uncomfortable; I find asking people to do things difficult (I feel I should do it myself) or I felt I patronised him, even when I saw he wasn’t doing something simple and straight forward (like opening the ambulance door or handing out the magazine).
Ornamental Pigeon (or Dove?)
Another rescue! A young pigeon had flown into a window and wasn’t able to fly any more. The finder put him into a box and tried to set him free for at least an hour but to no avail.
There wasn’t space nearby to park the ambulance, so Sally double parked and stayed in the ambulance. It was going to be just me and Paddy this time. It was an odd feeling; I felt alone! It was similar to my first shift as the ‘main’ co-driver, except this time I felt I had more of a handicap than any support.
I asked Paddy to open the door and get out of the ambulance, and I hurried after so I could grab the rescue box from the back. Imagine my utmost relief when Sally called out to us – the finder was coming towards the ambulance!
Sally stayed up front whilst Paddy and I talked to the finder who held a huge cardboard box with the pigeon inside. I explained we’d bring him inside the ambulance and transfer him to the rescue box there to prevent the risk of escape, and briefly that we’d bring him afterwards to the wildlife rescue centre.
This is when Paddy opened the box whilst it was still outside.
After I asked him to shut it, I handed the magazine to the finder, and climbed into the back of the ambulance where I saw the pigeon – a beautiful white ornamental dove! She was alert, but barely moved. Often birds are in a state of shock after a window collision and stay still for half an hour or more before they suddenly fly away. This one had already had an hour. Perhaps she would recover any time soon…
I was impressed Paddy was keen to move the bird into the rescue box himself, but I needed to stop him and remind him to put on the blue hygienic gloves. They’re not just for our hygiene, but also for the bird’s protection. The sweat and oils on our human hands interfere with the fat layer on a bird’s feathers and this isn’t healthy for them. Paddy donned his gloves, but I don’t think he was happy about it.
Sally was interested in the ornamental pigeon when I told her about it, and she asked whether it was ringed. Good question! I might have noticed if I’d handled the bird myself, though I must admit I hadn’t thought to check. Paddy was happy to go back into the back of the ambulance and check.
Sally postulated that maybe this was a bird used for a wedding ceremony who had got lost. I guess we’ll never know.
Inside the front cabin of the ambulance is a small window which allows us to look into the back. I was curious how it was going with the bird, so I took a peek. Paddy saw me and gave me a wave, highlighting he was wearing the blue gloves. At the time I thought he was taking the piss, but now I come to think of it later, I realise he’d already put them on before he knew I was watching (out of interest, and not spying!) so now I feel proud! 🙂
And he’d found a ring on the ornamental pigeon’s leg! This meant he was a pet and had an owner. I made sure this was noted in the admin; and I was happily surprised Paddy wanted to complete the rest of it. He said he was ready and wanted to email it off to the rescue centre, but first I wanted to check it was OK – including checking the expected time of our arrival was noted. Indeed, the time wasn’t noted (I entered it) and a section had been missed (I completed it) then I mailed it off.
Finally the report needed to be submitted to our internal system. This didn’t work! The fail-safe kicked in; as the animal was a pet I needed to include a photo with the submission. Sally suggested I use the tablet to take a picture of the picture from my phone. Good solution!
I’m sure if I’d handled the bird myself things would have worked out differently. My learning point here is sometimes I get too involved with people (in this case, Paddy) rather than focusing on the task at hand.
We delivered the ornamental pigeon to the rescue centre without any fuss, just before closing time. I’d like to think there was still time enough for the on-site vet to take a look at the patient instead of leaving her in the box overnight. As I was there, I took a moment to check the cupboards to see whether the baby pigeons from earlier had been collected and brought inside.
The cupboard doors have a handle (used to open and close the door) and a bolt. The bolt is closed once an animal is inside the cupboard. I’ve been told this sends a signal to the centre staff that an animal is ready for collection. I had a good look; there was no electrical contact in this mechanism, so I wonder if the signal is purely visual; it’s easy to see which bolts are in the closed position and therefore to know which cupboards are full – assuming the staff are already outside and looking.
When I looked, some handles were ‘open’ but the bolts closed. In theory this would mean there’s an animal inside, but it seems an unnatural movement to close a cupboard with a handle, leave it where it is, and mess about lining up the deadlock bolt. My fear is the public messed about with the doors, or even other animal ambulances who use the same facility.
Menial Chore
The last job on our list (actually the first but it didn’t involve a live animal so we relegated it) was collecting receipts from a supermarket for bottle deposits. In the Netherlands, some plastic and glass drinks bottles have a deposit on them. Feeding them into a machine prints out a receipt which can be handed in at the till for a discount, or posted into a box which we can collect and cash in.
On arrival at the supermarket we learned the box had a lock on it which needed a key to open which we should have brought with us! We had no idea! I made a note in the admin and left the ticket open for the next day shift.
