Wildlife Aid to the Rescue
by matt @ 3:53 pm. Blogged under Living and Dying, Thinking
When you own cats you have to expect to receive your fair share of interesting outdoor gifts. Bella, our youngest cat, began life outside by bringing in interesting leaves (holly) and strange pieces of plastic packaging. These days, having cleaned out the mice in the neighbourhood, she has begun to bring in birds. On Friday morning at 3am she brought in a blackbird which sat still in shock as she pulled feathers from it one by one. Fortunately for the blackbird this activity woke me up and forced me to investigate - sending Bella away so that the poor creature could be put in a darkened box until the morning. When 9am came Suzie_Q and I took the bird over to Wildlife Aid in Leatherhead.
Wildlife Aid is a Surrey wildlife trust that is a registered charity and dedicated to the rescue, care and rehabilitation of sick, injured and orphaned British wildlife. Open 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, they have a dedicated 24-hour emergency phone line (09061 800132) which I have now used on a number of occasions to see if they can accommodate one of our cat’s gifts. Having examined the blackbird which had lost a few feathers they said they thought it would be fine and make a full recovery.
While I was waiting for the blackbird’s diagnosis I noticed a sign on the wall about grey squirrels - in summary it said ‘We regret that injured grey squirrels will only be euthanised because they are vermin’ - so taking a grey squirrel anywhere for treatment will never result in a happy outcome for him/her. Apparently they eat birds eggs and baby birds as well as harming tree bark and outbreeding our native red squirrels. Indeed grey squirrels are listed on schedule 9 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. This makes it an offence to release, or allow escape, into the wild any grey squirrel. It is also an offence, by an Order under the Destructive Imported Animals Act 1932, to keep or import grey squirrels except under licence. I had no idea they were hated so much - I wonder what they would do with an injured white squirrel?
Technorati Tags: wildlife rescue, wildlife, countryside, squirrels, grey squirrel, vermin, pest control, cats, blackbirds
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June 11th, 2007 at 4:22 pm
I phoned up yesterday to see how our blackbird was getting on and whether they needed us to release him back in this area. They said he died… So much for our sweet fluffy cat! She is a KILLER!