7 Days Not Very Wild – Day 5 – 5 July 2015
7 Days not very Wild – Trying to do something wild each day
My idea is that sometimes even if we look for that great wild thing in nature, it can be hard to find because of all sorts of reasons mainly to do with humans destroying the world.
Having celebrated the nature we can find for 30 days, I wanted to highlight the nature I couldn’t find for 7 days, sort of as a warning that things aren’t just hunky-dory.
Day 5 – A lost baby bird
Sunday lunchtime a friend of my mum Sherry got in touch. Her son Tye and his girlfriend had been looking after a House Martin chick that had fallen out of its nest at her house in another village in the Chew Valley.
They had some nests by their roof but nowhere they could reach. The chick had been on the patio. Nature would have allowed for this kind of thing to happen with the parent seeing the chick, picking it up and returning it to the nest. However, this is not just not possible. With the number of domestic cats around, the chick would not have stood a chance even for half an hour.
Chicks this young are unlikely to survive. Even if we can keep it alive until it fledges, what then? They are still fed by their parents after they fledge.
So that is my issue impacting wildlife for day 5 which causes big problems for all kinds of wildlife, including domestic cats. Not happy with breeding and increasing our own numbers to the extent that the earth can not support us, we keep huge numbers of predators as pets as well.
Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig feeding a rescued House Martin chick
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig
Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig making a nest for a rescued House Martin chick
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig
Rescued House Martin chick
Photograph taken by and copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig
Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig feeding a rescued House Martin chick
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig
About The Author
Hi, I’m Dr. Mya-Rose Craig. I am a 19-year-old prominent British-Bangladeshi ornithologist, environmentalist, diversity activist as well as an author, speaker and broadcaster. At age 11 I started the popular blog Birdgirl, and at age 17 I became the youngest person to see half of the birds in the world.
Lyrical, poignant and insightful.’ - Margaret Atwood
This is my story; a journey defined by my love for these extraordinary creatures. Because large or small, brown, patterned or jewelled, there is something about birds that makes us, even for just moments at a time, lift our eyes away from our lives and up to the skies.
Lyrical, poignant and insightful.’ - Margaret Atwood
This is my story; a journey defined by my love for these extraordinary creatures. Because large or small, brown, patterned or jewelled, there is something about birds that makes us, even for just moments at a time, lift our eyes away from our lives and up to the skies.