We were out for a walk last week when we heard an almighty racket coming from a garden ahead of us. On looking through the hedge I could see a heron standing in a garden pond.
There was a cat watching it. The heron was yelling at the cat!
I went into the garden and shooed away the cat. The heron did not move. I went closer. It then tried to take off, but failed. It had a plastic net wrapped round a foot. The net was stuck down to the pond. So the heron crash landed again.
The cat started to sneak back.
I knocked on the door of the house. No reply, so I rang the police and asked if they could contact the RSPB. In the meantime my wife went next door and roused the neighbours.
Soon there were six of us standing around watching the heron when the house owner emerged and asked what was going on. She did say it explained why the cat hadn’t come in for its tea.
At this point the neighbour’s wife turned up with a tea towel, suggesting she could throw it over the bird’s head while one of us took the netting off its foot. I took a look at the beak on the thing and suggested we should just wait for the RSPB. The owner said that if it was still stuck when it got dark she would ask her husband to cut it free so foxes didn’t attack it in the night.
We continued our walk. On the way back the heron was standing in the pond again.
We got home much later than planned and were just about to eat our evening meal when my phone went. It was a wildlife protection officer from the RSPCA – the RSPB had passed the call on! She was over an hour away and wanted to know what was going on. So I drove round to the cottage where the heron had been and found that they had cut the plastic so it could fly away.
However, it still had the netting stuck to its foot. But now at least it could peck it free without being bothered by cats or foxes. So I called the RSPCA officer back told her not to bother coming out.
Posts
