T battled through layer after layer of sleet as it landed into its destination. A sinking feeling filled me during the trip, intensifying as I made my way through the airport. I resented coming back to the town where I had grown up, after residing on the other side of the world for what had felt like a lifetime.
After a short while, I ventured out to get a haircut. My thoughts was far away, focused on an vast expanse of water, when I heard something smack into the pavement. I glanced down to see a bird on its back, splayed out, and convulsing.
The impact happened just as kids were emerging from the local elementary school and so within a short time a small chorus of youngsters had assembled, flanked by their mums and dads. This ring of confused faces looked down at the pigeon, uncertain what to think or act. The kids were more decisive: “Papa, she needs hospital, can we call an emergency service?” I slipped off my anorak, knelt down and scooped the pigeon inside it. “Don’t worry, sweet, the gentleman will take care of her!” remarked one parent with a sigh of relief. I had been transformed into the rescue vehicle for this pigeon that had just come down hard, against its will, as I had a couple of days prior.
I made my way home, arms stiffly extended, with the bird nestled inside the coat.
I had no idea that my impromptu decision to rescue my feathered charge (the name I bestowed upon my avian patient) would direct me to a community of local residents devoting significant amounts of time to provide not only rescue services for feral pigeons but diagnostic imaging, convalescence, and even “bird rehabilitation”.
I found a small container for Belinda, lined it with an old shirt, and put her inside. Every half hour or so, I’d peek inside just long enough for us to awkwardly lock eyes.
Those moments of mutual confusion interrupted my frantic search for what to do next. I phoned friends for suggestions and one recommended trying social media, where, to my surprise, I found a Manchester Pigeon Rehab group, and put in a request to join.
A Grassroots Network
With a large membership, the group has an anarchic system: someone in Manchester finds an ailing pigeon, a heartfelt post is made, then a comment section “triage” ensues. If the bird is judged in need of an X-ray, someone with a veterinary contact can arrange it; if it needs physio, a “carer” will offer to care for the bird.
Carers each have their own carefully cultivated skills, whether it’s repairing broken wings or treating wounds. Their tremendous, combined effort for the pigeons of the city runs entirely on goodwill.
Belinda was rapidly diagnosed with brain trauma, likely a blow to the head, and placed with a rehabber who would provide medication and a regimen of patient physio. We never found out exactly what caused her to drop from above. I assumed the role of avian courier once more, taking the tram across the city with Belinda in a container on my lap so she could receive the care she deserved.
An Unexpected Lesson
After discovering this underground pigeon “support system”, I began to feel much differently about being back in my city. I doubt any of the places I had lived in while away could claim anything comparable. It also occurred to me that this was not the first time I’d been connected to a pigeon aid mission: almost 20 years earlier I’d witnessed one fall from the sky into the grounds of my high school. Again, children surrounded the bird, but only one – my friend at the time – had the courage to rescue it and take it to safety.
The aforementioned friend has since died – one of a number of companions to lose their lives in the years before my exit from Manchester. I understood that this had been a major reason of what had made coming back so difficult.
Feathered Support
Pigeons have a history as “companion” animals, especially in the North. Workers started to keep the birds because they gave them comfort and an opportunity to look up at the heavens between long shifts of subterranean gloom. During the hard times, workers on the unemployment also found comfort in pigeons, but keeping them was considered a sign of “social malaise”.
Nowadays, pigeons are often dismissed as unintelligent, dirty or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had spoken to a vet, who told me: “if you bring it here, leave it in the car park and we’ll euthanise it.”
That? Not our Belinda. Although unlikely to ever soar , she has taken to her newly earthbound life with grace in a volunteer’s spare bedroom. Each satisfied coo, often caused by her favourite snack, vegetables, feels like a demonstration in resilience and fortitude – and I am eternally thankful to her for unveiling for me another side to the city I thought I knew.
