My Senses Shook

The air moistening and the sky graying, I thought I should leave the lake without making the full loop, but pressed on anyway.  I think I am glad I did.

On the path to the beach, something rustled ahead, and I looked, glimpsed gray feathers, thought Heron! and tiptoed on, careful not to startle the bird.  Closer, I focused on its head, the one yellow eye, the beak, and thought I could continue to sneak without frightening it.   Only much closer did I realize it seemed stuck in a vine, struggling to get to safety into the woods.  It flopped over, opened its wide wings, closed the left one, and sort of lumped onto the leaves.

Then I knew: it was injured.

I ran to the car, drove to Lynne's house (she had saved an owl and would know what to do).  We went to the lake, and she saw what I had missed: blood along the edge of the path.  She called Margaret (Margaret rescues birds) at two different numbers, found a message at both.  Then she called Lucia, who knew David's phone number, which Lynne called.  No answer.  We drove to David's house, rang the bell, but only Junebug answered with vigorous barking.  Then we went to the shop to get the cell number for Sarah, David's wife.  She didn't know where he was, but she would let him know. 

Within the hour while I readied for work, they returned to the bird.  David picked it up, found the leg torn away right into the bone, and moved the heron further into the woods.  Later, he dispatched it, writing "the heron's end was swift and probably painless.  Let's hope wherever its life goes after here is less broken."

Yes, let's hope.  And let's thank those who came to the rescue as a result of my chance encounter, one that has left "my senses shook," as Richard Wilbur wrote in "The Groundhog."

I shall miss watching that Great Blue Heron fish in the shallows.

Heron

As I rounded the last turn of Highway 82 to head up the hill to Bell Buckle at about 7:10 this morning, a great blue heron glided above my car from the left. After years of living in Louisiana where such birds were a common sight, I am still taken aback by the cranes and herons living here. Indeed, my first month in Bell Buckle, I saw one perched on the fencing above a tennis court.

The above image is from the Graham Owen Gallery online.

A couple of years ago, in November, I was lucky enough to see seventeen young whooping cranes on their migration behind an ultra-light to Florida. As I topped a hill on I-24 at about mile marker 122 going north, I saw enormous birds flying fairly low over the interstate. As I registered their size, I also noticed the ultra-light. I immediately sped up, way above the speed limit, trying to get them, but as I drew closer, they disappeared over a line of trees and hillocks. Later that day, after much research, I discovered I had seen Operation Migration, the migration of the whoopers. Soon after their landing in Florida, all but one (who had stopped out along the way) died in a tornado.

I admire the people who devote themselves to helping these birds survive despite odds against them and I am in awe of the birds themselves for their stamina and intelligence. Great birds are great.