Hi Marian,

What a shame that it turned out the way that it did. Your story reminded me
of when I rescued a Pacific Loon that was sitting on one of the white lane
separator bumps in the middle of a freeway early one morning in the south
San Francisco Bay Area (an unusual sighting in the South Bay even when not
sitting on a lane marker on a freeway). I picked it up and brought it back
to my car . However, memories of stunned birds that I picked up that
finally came too while I was driving (Eastern Screech Owl, Red-naped
Sapsucker, Ring-necked Pheasant) and flew around a bit in the car made me a
little gun shy of keeping it in the car. I placed it on a tennis racket
that I had in the trunk and continued my drive to the coast . 30 minutes
later, I got to the Santa Cruz Harbor, opened the trunk and the loon was
still contently sitting there. I picked up the tennis racket with the loon
on it and marched over to the water carrying the level loon laden racket
over my head so the loon could see the water. It got excited and jumped
when it saw water but unfortunately didn't reach the water on that attempt.
I had to pick it up again and give it a final toss. It "took to water"
immediately and floated away and eventually flapped its wings and took a
short flight before settling in again and doing so much needed preening.
Wildlife is often quite resilient!

Jim
--
Jim Danzenbaker
Battle Ground, WA
360-723-0345
jdanzenbaker at gmail.com


On Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 9:34 PM, Marian Murdoch <marianmurdoch at yahoo.com>wrote:

> August 13, 2009
> Bremerton, WA
> Warren Ave Bridge
>
> R.I.P. little cormorant. :( He was sitting in the middle of a busy bridge
> in the middle of a horrible rainstorm, obviously wounded, as the traffic
> whizzed by him on both sides, no one thinking twice about the little guy,
> some almost missing him by inches. I battled with myself. Should I stop,
> should I just let nature take its course? I turned around, found a place to
> park and waited for the traffic to clear. Ran into the road, got him wrapped
> in a little towel and carried him back to the car. He was a young one, his
> body only about a foot long (not counting the neck and head). His bill was
> black and his feathers were soft and fluffy. It was the most beautiful bird
> I have ever seen, so jet black, the tail feathers showing an iridescence in
> the sunlight. As I carried him to the car, he raised his head and placed it
> on my chest and closed its eyes. He died on the way to the vet. :( I
> tried...
>
> Marian Murdoch
> Belfair, WA
> marianmurdoch at yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> Tweeters mailing list
> Tweeters at u.washington.edu
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>
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