survival of the fittest
May. 31st, 2005 06:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
llywelaWell, the day started out dull and chilly, but since the afternoon brightened up into actual summer with warm sunshine and everything, I decided to take myself out for a walk. My favourite walk, I decided, which takes me through three parks and around the lake, and takes about an hour in total.
I set off. Just around the corner from my house is the first park, the recreation ground: a children's play area backing on to a wide expanse of grass, which in winter is set up with rugby poles and football nets, ringed around with trees of all description, with a pretty stream running up one side. If you follow the stream, it leads you across a narrow road into the second park, the pleasure gardens, and very pleasant they are too, all formal gardens, tennis courts and bowls lawns.
It was here in the pleasure gardens that I was brought to an abrupt halt. Stopping to admire the flowers on a bush I couldn't name, I noticed a movement near my feet and was horrified to realise it was a very very newly hatched baby bird that had fallen out of its nest. Every maternal instinct I possess sprang into play on seeing this helpless, vulnerable newborn - and yet, what could I do for it? All the advice says not to interfere and to let nature takes its course. If the parents return and find the infant on the floor, they will either get it back up to the nest or may try to nest it on the ground until it is old enough to fly. If they don't find it, it will die. End of story.
Good advice, until you are standing there with this baby creature at your feet, thrashing its limbs in the manner of all newborns. It was so newly hatched it hadn't even opened its eyes, couldn't raise its head and was almost completely bald. I couldn't just leave it there, thrashing about blindly in the dust of the path, where anyone could step on it. I picked it up, and it nestled into the palm of my hand, this tiny, helpless baby. With no sign of a nest to put it back into, I then put it down again just to the side of the path, at the edge of the bush it must have fallen from, hoping that here it would be a little more protected from passing feet, and continued with my walk.
Just across another narrow road from the pleasure gardens, you come to Roath Park proper, following that same stream back up its course past the rose gardens and hot house, past the children's play area, up to the lake. This is my absolute favourite place. The immense boating lake, ringed around with trees and grassy banks, is home to colonies of ducks, geese and swans, not to mention an assortment of far rarer wildfowl. Visitors to the lake are able, in the summer months, to take small boats out on the water, but not to visit the four small islands at the north end of the lake - these are protected habitats.
I walked around the lake, and enjoyed its beauty, as always. It is especially lovely at this time of the year, when everything is so green and fresh. The banks of the lake were littered with nests - ducks and geese, and two mated pairs of swans, their dreys safely fenced off to give the birds some privacy from curious humans. For years now, I have watched successive clutches of baby birds hatch and grow. But today I wasn't able to enjoy my walk as I usually do. My mind kept returning to the lower park, to that ickle wee hatchling fighting for life down on the ground.
I walked back the same route I had come, to check on the baby. It was still there, still breathing, still thrashing thise stumpy, featherless limbs but unable to open its eyes or raise its head. I watched it for a while, and then returned home with a heavy heart, sure that it would not survive but helpless to do anything for it.
After tea, I went out again. I wanted to see the baby again, to see how it was doing. It wasn't there. I could think of only three ways this could have happened: (1) it had been killed by an animal - maybe a dog being walked, or a cat from a nearby house; (2) some well meaning person had happened by and found it, just as I had, and moved it; (3) the parents had returned and somehow managed to get it back up to the nest.
However unlikely it may be, I've decided to go with option 3. Survival of the fittest be damned - I want to sleep tonight believing that my tiny newborn baby bird has managed to survive.
I set off. Just around the corner from my house is the first park, the recreation ground: a children's play area backing on to a wide expanse of grass, which in winter is set up with rugby poles and football nets, ringed around with trees of all description, with a pretty stream running up one side. If you follow the stream, it leads you across a narrow road into the second park, the pleasure gardens, and very pleasant they are too, all formal gardens, tennis courts and bowls lawns.
It was here in the pleasure gardens that I was brought to an abrupt halt. Stopping to admire the flowers on a bush I couldn't name, I noticed a movement near my feet and was horrified to realise it was a very very newly hatched baby bird that had fallen out of its nest. Every maternal instinct I possess sprang into play on seeing this helpless, vulnerable newborn - and yet, what could I do for it? All the advice says not to interfere and to let nature takes its course. If the parents return and find the infant on the floor, they will either get it back up to the nest or may try to nest it on the ground until it is old enough to fly. If they don't find it, it will die. End of story.
Good advice, until you are standing there with this baby creature at your feet, thrashing its limbs in the manner of all newborns. It was so newly hatched it hadn't even opened its eyes, couldn't raise its head and was almost completely bald. I couldn't just leave it there, thrashing about blindly in the dust of the path, where anyone could step on it. I picked it up, and it nestled into the palm of my hand, this tiny, helpless baby. With no sign of a nest to put it back into, I then put it down again just to the side of the path, at the edge of the bush it must have fallen from, hoping that here it would be a little more protected from passing feet, and continued with my walk.
Just across another narrow road from the pleasure gardens, you come to Roath Park proper, following that same stream back up its course past the rose gardens and hot house, past the children's play area, up to the lake. This is my absolute favourite place. The immense boating lake, ringed around with trees and grassy banks, is home to colonies of ducks, geese and swans, not to mention an assortment of far rarer wildfowl. Visitors to the lake are able, in the summer months, to take small boats out on the water, but not to visit the four small islands at the north end of the lake - these are protected habitats.
I walked around the lake, and enjoyed its beauty, as always. It is especially lovely at this time of the year, when everything is so green and fresh. The banks of the lake were littered with nests - ducks and geese, and two mated pairs of swans, their dreys safely fenced off to give the birds some privacy from curious humans. For years now, I have watched successive clutches of baby birds hatch and grow. But today I wasn't able to enjoy my walk as I usually do. My mind kept returning to the lower park, to that ickle wee hatchling fighting for life down on the ground.
I walked back the same route I had come, to check on the baby. It was still there, still breathing, still thrashing thise stumpy, featherless limbs but unable to open its eyes or raise its head. I watched it for a while, and then returned home with a heavy heart, sure that it would not survive but helpless to do anything for it.
After tea, I went out again. I wanted to see the baby again, to see how it was doing. It wasn't there. I could think of only three ways this could have happened: (1) it had been killed by an animal - maybe a dog being walked, or a cat from a nearby house; (2) some well meaning person had happened by and found it, just as I had, and moved it; (3) the parents had returned and somehow managed to get it back up to the nest.
However unlikely it may be, I've decided to go with option 3. Survival of the fittest be damned - I want to sleep tonight believing that my tiny newborn baby bird has managed to survive.
