Mary, et al...I live in Ocean Shores and see few live beached Murres...most
are dead, so I too give the live ones a boost back into the water. (They
just are not built for walking!) I figure they have a better chance at
surviving there than on the sand with all the gulls waiting for them to get
too weak to fight them off.
Dianna Moore
Ocean Shores, Wa.
dlmoor2 at coastaccess.com

----- Original Message -----
From: MaryK <bassclef at seanet.com>
To: Tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Saturday, October 05, 2002 8:27 PM
Subject: Was This a Mistake???


Hi Tweeters,

I was down at Ocean Shores today, won't go into detail as it wasn't much
of a trip for me. Anyway, at the jetty abt 2 hrs (?) after high tide,
there was a Common Murre on the sand, struggling to get to the water.
It didn't appear to be injured, just wasn't doing very well on land,
surprise surprise. I asked someone about it, and he said he'd been
watching it for about 30 minutes trying to make its way to the ocean.
Stagger, stagger, face plant. After abt 5 min I couldn't stand it
anymore and picked up the bird and took it into the ocean. It cruised
away unscathed, so far as I could tell. The main reason I did it was
'coz there were large and small people running/walking by it, and
several dogs a few yards down the beach. You can imagine the gruesome
scene that could've played out.

Would it have been better to leave it alone? Let nature take its
course, etc. Or was it OK to carry it its final 20 feet or so?? It was
heading there anyway...

Mary

Mary E. Klein
bassclef at seanet.com