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Our aircraft pushed through successive sheets of icy precipitation as it landed into its destination. A sinking feeling filled me during the journey, only deepening as I shuffled through the terminal. I resented having to be the place where I had grown up, after making a home on the far side of the world for what had felt like a an age.

After a couple of days, I headed out to get a my hair cut. My mind was miles away, focused on an sea, when I became aware of something smack into the ground. I looked down to see a rock dove on its wings, splayed out, and trembling.

The impact occurred just as schoolchildren were emerging from the local grade school and so within moments a group of youngsters had assembled, accompanied by their mums and dads. This ring of puzzled faces looked down at the creature, not knowing what to say or do. The kids were more definitive: “Papa, she needs help, can we call an animal ambulance?” I slipped off my jacket, bent down and gently lifted the pigeon inside it. “It’s okay, love, the kind man will help her!” said one mother with a audible relief. I had been transformed into the ambulance for this pigeon that had just fallen suddenly, unintentionally, as I had a short time earlier.

I made my way home, arms stiffly extended, with the bird curled up inside the coat.

Little did I know that my on-the-spot decision to aid Belinda (the name I chose for my new friend) would direct me to a community of city dwellers sacrificing significant amounts of effort to provide not only transport for feral pigeons but diagnostic imaging, respite care, and even “pigeon physio”.

I retrieved a cardboard box for Belinda, lined it with an old piece of cloth, and put her inside. Every 20 minutes or so, I’d open the box just long enough for us to share a momentary glance.

Those moments of common confusion punctuated my desperate search for what to do from there. I called friends for guidance and one suggested trying Facebook, where, to my amazement, I stumbled upon a local pigeon rescue group, and put in a request to join.

A Community Effort

With a large membership, the group follows an anarchic method: someone in Manchester stumbles across an ailing pigeon, a heartfelt post is created, then a comment section “evaluation” takes place. If the bird is deemed in need of an X-ray, someone with a veterinary contact can arrange it; if it needs rehabilitation, a “rehabber” will offer to foster the bird.

Carers each have their own carefully cultivated specialities, whether it’s repairing broken wings or treating wounds. Their momentous, cooperative effort for the pigeons of the city depends completely on goodwill.

Belinda was rapidly assessed with neurological problems, likely a concussion, and placed with a rehabber who would provide comfort and a program of patient physio. We never discovered exactly what caused her to drop from above. I assumed the role of bird taxi once more, riding the tram across the city with Belinda in a box on my lap so she could receive the treatment she deserved.

An Unexpected Lesson

After finding this secret pigeon “NHS”, I began to feel much differently about being back in my home town. I am skeptical any of the places I had lived in while away could have anything even close. It also struck me that this was not the first time I’d been connected to a pigeon recovery: almost 20 years earlier I’d observed one fall from the sky into the playground of my high school. Again, children gathered around the bird, but only one – my best friend at the time – had the nerve to pick it up and take it to security.

The individual has since been lost – one of a number of companions to pass away in the years before my exit from Manchester. I understood that this had been a significant factor of what had made returning home so painful.

Feathered Support

Pigeons have a tradition as “companion” animals, especially in the north of England. Laborers started to raise the birds because they gave them solace and an reason to stare at the sky between long shifts of subterranean gloom. During the economic downturn, workers on the unemployment also found a distraction in pigeons, but keeping them was viewed as a sign of “idleness”.

Nowadays, pigeons are often written off as unintelligent, dirty or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had contacted a vet, who told me: “if you bring the bird here, leave it in the parking lot and we’ll end its life.”

That? Not her. Although unlikely to ever soar , she has adapted to her newly grounded life with grace in a volunteer’s home. Each contented call, often caused by her favourite snack, vegetables, feels like a example in adaptability and strength – and I am eternally thankful to her for revealing to me a new dimension to the city I thought I knew.