My Soft Spot for Animals

My Soft Spot for Animals

   In the interest of an animal I've committed a murder!

I've had it from an early age already: I couldn't see an animal suffer.

I even committed a “murder” to stop this.

I must have been only ten years old. I was home alone and was sitting in the garden when I suddenly saw that our cat had caught a little bird. It was a very young bird, it didn't even have feathers yet. I chased the cat off and she let go of it, but unfortunately it was already too late, it was injured very badly.

One of it's wing was almost bitten off and it was bleeding. I – just a very young child – knew that I couldn't save it, it was injured too badly. I held it in my hand, it was floundering, it really was suffering. I knew that I had to release it from its pain and there was only one solution for it: to kill it as soon as possible.

Therefore, I took a bucket with water and dipped the poor thing under. While I did this I also squeezed its fragile throat, so that its end would come quicker. After a minute, I thought that it would be dead, but it wasn't the case. When I inspected it after such a long time under water, it was still breathing and gasping for air! The poor thing, I cried – this was so gruesome to see, and now I had to do it over again!

In my eyes it seemed as if it took hours and now I still feel sorrow for the little one but I had to do it, but I still regret that it didn't go faster.

Thereafter I buried it in the garden. 
It took me days to get over it, and I often went to the place were I buried it and asked for forgiveness but in fact: I had committed a murder in the interest of the animal.

This happened when I was ten – but one year later I found a cat with its head almost shopped off by a *trolley car (*or tram), and of course the animal was dead. Grown-up people stood there, gaping indifferent, they did nothing.

So, out of “respect” for the dead animal, and to prevent that it would become ran over again and again by the following trolley cars, I took the dead cat by its tail and took it to my home.

I first thought that it was ours, but it wasn't. Ours was sitting in the garden. So my father has buried the dead cat in our garden.
Some time later we discovered that it was our neighbour's cat, (they looked almost the same).  But, even if they had looked differently – I would have done the same – and I felt sorry for this one. 

Throughout the years I saved many birds and also a wild kitten.

I am a runner, and when I'm in good health, I run every other day, through woodlands and fields through the countryside.

I found the kitten in a ditch with water. I took it out and laid it on a safe spot in the neighborhood in the assumption that the mother must be there somewhere. When I returned, I saw that the mother was taking care of it, she had found it. 

That really made my day.

I rescued several birds and took them to a bird rescue shelter, where they know us already.

One of my latest rescuees

The employee of the bird sanctuary here shows the wounded pigeon.

What I can't stand is: that a dead animal becomes run over by cars over and over again.

When they aren't totally crushed yet, I take them and lay them at the side of the road. (I always keep tissues in my pocket for this.)

The list of dead animals I laid beside the road is long, I will spare you from it, but it happened in separate situations that I saved birds.

I thought that the birds were dead, because I had just seen more than one car drive over them, (they weren't hit by the wheels) but when I came closer then – to pick them up – they moved a little, they were only in shock or slightly injured. While I went home with them, I kept them warm and safe between my sweater and my runners coat. Of course I couldn't run now, the birds would become scared then, so I walked.

Back home I took care of them for a while and they recovered.

Thereafter, I took them back to the area where I had found them. It was beautiful to see them fly off: I had saved another life.

That I saved Pipke, was the best thing I could ever have done. 

It changed our lives completely.

Bye, bye!

Next time I will continue the story with the titel: A Companion for Pipke!
Hope to see you again and thanks for reading.