🔗 Share this article

The plane pushed through wall after wall of icy precipitation on its descent into its destination. A sinking feeling filled me during the trip, intensifying as I walked through the terminal. I resented having to be the city where I had spent my youth, after residing on the opposite end of the world for what had felt like a lifetime.

After a few days, I headed out to get a my hair cut. My mind was far away, focused on an sea, when I heard something strike the sidewalk. I glanced down to see a bird on its back, spatchcocked, and convulsing.

The impact occurred just as kids were emerging from the local grade school and so within a short time a group of children had gathered, surrounded by their mums and dads. This group of bemused faces peered down at the bird, uncertain what to do or say. The kids were more decisive: “Papa, she needs help, can we call an animal ambulance?” I removed my coat, bent down and scooped the pigeon up into it. “Don’t worry, dear, the kind man will take care of her!” remarked one mother with a sigh of relief. I had become the ambulance for this pigeon that had just landed abruptly, involuntarily, as I had a couple of days prior.

I made my way home, arms held out, with the bird curled up inside the coat.

Little did I know that my impromptu decision to medivac Belinda (the name I gave my new friend) would guide me to a community of city dwellers sacrificing significant amounts of their time to provide not only transport for city pigeons but scans, recovery care, and even “bird rehabilitation”.

I retrieved a small container for Belinda, lined it with an old T-shirt, and put her inside. Every half hour or so, I’d peek inside just long enough for us to share a momentary glance.

Those moments of shared bewilderment interrupted my hectic search for what to do next. I phoned friends for guidance and one suggested trying social media, where, to my amazement, I found a bird rehabilitation group, and submitted a request to become a member.

A Community Effort

Over 3,000-strong, the group has an anarchic model: someone in Manchester discovers an ailing pigeon, a pleading post is created, then a comment section “assessment” takes place. If the bird is considered in need of an scan, someone with a vet link can get it one; if it needs therapy, a “carer” will offer to look after the bird.

Volunteers each have their own finely honed expertise, whether it’s mending broken wings or treating wounds. Their momentous, collective effort for the pigeons of the city depends completely on goodwill.

Belinda was quickly assessed with a neurological issue, likely a concussion, and assigned to a rehabber who would administer medication and a course of careful physio. We never learned exactly what caused her to plummet. I resumed the role of avian courier once more, riding the streetcar across the city with Belinda in a box on my lap so she could get the treatment she deserved.

An Unexpected Lesson

After discovering this hidden pigeon “health service”, I began to feel much differently about being back in my hometown. I doubt any of the places I had lived in while away could claim anything comparable. It also dawned on me that this was not the first time I’d been connected to a pigeon rescue: almost 20 years earlier I’d seen one fall from the sky into the playground of my high school. Again, children gathered around the bird, but only one – my friend at the time – had the gall to pick it up and take it to a safe place.

The friend in question has since been lost – one of four friends to pass away in the years before my exit from Manchester. I understood that this had been a big part of what had made returning home so hard.

Feathered Support

Pigeons have a history as “therapy” animals, especially in the North. Workers started to care for the birds because they gave them solace and an reason to stare at the open air between long shifts of darkness below. During the Depression, workers on the unemployment also found solace in pigeons, but keeping them was considered a sign of “despair”.

Nowadays, pigeons are often written off as stupid, unclean or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had contacted a veterinarian, who told me: “if you bring that here, leave it in the car park and we’ll euthanise it.”

It? Not our Belinda. Although unlikely to ever fly again , she has embraced her newly earthbound life with success in a volunteer’s extra room. Each contented coo, often caused by her favourite food, peas, feels like a example in adaptability and resilience – and I am always appreciative to her for revealing to me a different facet to the city I thought I knew.