Blackbird

I was in my bedroom one day in the spring of 2004 when I heard a terrible commotion in the courtyard. I rushed, as best I could, out of my door and down the stairs and saw a small bird of prey with a fledgling in it's claws.

The baby bird was too heavy and the bird of prey, (a sparrowhawk perhaps) dropped it repeatedly, grabbed it and all the while the father blackbird was screeching at it and flapping it's wings close.

I shooed it away, the bird of prey, and saw that the fat little fledgling was in quite a state, covered in blood and with its wing crooked, so I took it upstairs and popped it in a shoebox.

I contacted The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and they said that their van was passing after midnight and would pick it up. They advised me to leave the box on the street. I wondered if they were insane, having me leave a bird in a box on the street in central London and told them I'd rather stay up for them. I waited until three but they never showed, nor the next day either. On the third day I spoke to a representative on the telephone again. 'You do realise,' said the girl, 'that it won't be able to ever fly again so they will kill it?'

I had been providing it with water from a pipette but now it was time to follow, loosely, some instructions on feeding from the internet. I bought bacon and scrambled some eggs both of which the little one enjoyed.

After ten days it seemed to have recovered and I released it. I lived in a flat with a lovely courtyard then. All day long the blackbird family, the four other fledglings being unable to fly still, would be hopping around in the vines which covered the outer wall under the watchful eye of the father. My young blackbird was unable to flutter up to join its siblings and so followed the group from the floor.

I assumed it had been eaten by someone when I could no longer see it hopping on the floor a week later but, in fact, it had regained the ability to flutter. A while later still and the fledglings were growing their adult feathers. My blackbird grew a streak of white where his wing was damaged and so I could identify him for three years to come as he fathered little groups of blackbirds in the courtyard.

Consuelo saved a blackbird a few weeks ago and, in doing so, reminded me of mine. Qué coincince! Years later Consuelo and I would feed birds in the courtyard from our kitchen window, encouraging more species to nest there. We had bluetits, great tits, blackbirds, finches but then a great big jay came along and scared everyone away.