Sleepless Night

Two of three juvenile red-tailed hawks that I helped rescue, raise and release

Yesterday, my brother-in-law, a good friend and I visited a friend/fellow bird rescuer living in Moline, IL. She has increasing mobility issues and asked if I could help with a few household chores, yard work and with bird care. We’re not well-acquainted or close friends but I was aware of the fact that she was a hoarder and that the birds in her care were in need of serious assistance. Beaks and nails, for example, were overgrown and in dire need of trimming.

Well, after a brief detour that took us to an incorrect address that was a probable drug house, we arrived at my friend’s to discover that a friend of hers was waiting for us. She took us in to meet my friend and to go over what work needed to be done. My brother-in-law and friend took charge of the outdoor labor requirements while I helped in the bird room — which was nothing short of a pitiful disaster that nearly made me cry. My friend’s own living quarters weren’t terrible; more badly cluttered and grimy than filthy; the birds’, on the other hand, were about as bad as I’d feared. Literally inches of bird droppings on the floor, all over walls and cages, and with no windows uncovered to allow in light, or opened to allow in fresh air. It was just miserable. Unhealthy in every respect for her and for the sixty or so able-bodied and disabled birds living in a small bedroom.

She wanted me to focus on capturing the birds, so she could examine them, trim nails and beaks, and to address any injuries. Since a little less than half or so were permanently caged, I had to net or catch about thirty birds, in a small room filled with obstacles, poor air circulation — even after I opened windows — and a slippery floor. About four hours later, I had managed to capture and secure all of the birds requiring attention, many of which were in awful physical condition; did some vacuuming, scraping/scrubbing and hole-filling.

I’ve heard of hoarder situations like my friend’s but had never experienced one firsthand, where the hoarding mentality had crossed over into including the animal or pet realm. Clearly, this woman has a mental problem. Not only does she insist that none of the birds are releasable (wrong) but that she would not even trust her best friend to help take any of them off of her hands. These are “her babies.” And she even firmly told me that she would rather die with them than live without them.

There’s so much to write about this and I probably will. I believe my friend’s biggest problem, however, is a lack of anything resembling a life of happiness absent the birds. Her disability is limiting; her job sucks; and she is at odds with family members over the hoarding issue. Even the friend we met seemed at her wit’s end. Nonetheless, I don’t think animals of any species, or people for that matter, should become a crutch for someone. Especially when in doing so, the lives you claim to love are put into jeopardy, as those of these birds clearly and unfortunately are.

I am going to do all that I can for my friend BUT I’m not going to be an enabler for her either. The odds are pretty good, unfortunately, that I’ll have to report her. Not sure as to whom yet. And until I do, I will, as compassionately as possible, encourage her to release the birds that can be and find other rehabbers to assume care for many if not most of the disabled ones that are languishing in truly horrible conditions.

Anyone who knows me KNOWS that I take this stuff very seriously. Animals are one of the dearest things to my heart and soul. And because of this I can’t help but feel incredibly empathetic towards my friend. I can’t deny that she is doing good to a great degree for the birds that she’s saved from being killed. But there’s also no denying that the good is being overshadowed by her mental illness that is preventing her from seeing — let alone understanding — the bad.