Phyllida, Philander, and Phineas

This was the best picture of the bunch.  It's hard to take pictures through a slightly messy window!

Remember Phillip and Phoebe, the sweet pheasant couple that lived here before us?  We got to meet three of their babies today, in most unusual circumstances.

This morning, Em bursts into my room, trembling with excitement.

"Mom!  Mom!  There are three baby birds in my window well!  Come see, come see!!"

I hopped out of bed and hurried over to the girls' room.  Sitting on Em's bed, which is next to the window, are Gee, Hebs, and Yummy.  (Zee was already at school, and Daddy comes home tonight.)  When the kids see me, they start up their own clamor.

Looking out the window, I see one...two...three baby birds.  They have spiky feathers (pin feathers?), with just a few downy-er looking ones.  Peering up to the sky, I can just make out an adult bird head bobbing anxiously around.  Knowing absolutely nothing about birds, I have no idea what kind of chicks they are, but one thing is clear:  Although they take turns frantically flapping their wings, the highest any of them get is about three inches off the ground.

Our window wells on that side of the house are six feet deep.

Trying to calm the kids down, I let Em take some pictures, and then send her and Gee off to get ready for school.  "Don't worry," says I.  "I will figure out a way to get the baby birdies back to their mommy."  How, I've only got the foggiest of ideas.  It has to do with calling Animal Control, the animal shelter, or, as last resort, my friend S.B.Z. who works for Hogle Zoo up in SLC.

The animal shelter doesn't open until 9, and we have fifteen minutes till then.  Firmly telling the kids to stay inside, I crept out to see if I could tell what kind of bird Anxious Momma was.  I didn't want to scare her away, so I started on the other side of the house and tiptoed around the fenceline.

It was Phoebe, the female pheasant.  She was nervously pacing around the window well, looking down every so often.  Phillip was over in the park, lingering on the edge of our property.

I went over to Mema's to ask if I should wait, or try to help out in some way.  She agreed with me that waiting fifteen minutes wasn't unreasonable, and--of course--came down to Em's room to see the birdies.

Getting a distracted Em ready for school and out the door was a job in itself, but I convinced her that the babies would be just fine, and I would tell her ALL about it once she got home from school.  Shooing Em and Gee out the front door, and cautioning them to be quiet and quick about getting over to the park, I went back to the phones.

Finally I was able to reach the animal shelter.  They recommended I call the police to ask for Animal Control, and gave me the number.  The nice woman at dispatch took down my information, and promise to send someone out.

 Hebs, Yummy, and I sat in the front room to wait for the police officers.  Hebs noticed that Phoebe was over in the front (rather than the side) of the house, herding at least five-six other little chicks across the street.  The little birds scurried across the street, but Phoebe stood, irresolute, in the middle of the yard.  I swear, her head was turning first to the other chicks in the weeds of the empty lot across the street, and then it would swivel back to the house where her three babies were trapped.  It about broke my heart.

Fortunately, just then, a police SUV pulled up.  Hooray!  Phoebe ran across the street to her other babies.  The police officer (I neglected to get his name) hopped out, we talked for a moment, and then he pulled some long poles with grabbers on the ends.  I walked him over to the window well.

"Whoa!" he said.  "That's a deep window well.  These won't work.  Let's see, do you have a five gallon bucket around?"

I sure did. (We've been using them to pick up trash, rocks, and to mix paint in.  Handy things.)  He picked one up and climbed down into the window well, very gently.

The three little chicks all ran to hide under the fairy garden I made for Em's birthday.  (It's propped up a little so she can see it from her bed.)  This actually worked to our advantage, because he blocked one end of the garden, and put the bucket at the other end.  Hebs and Yummy watched the whole time from Em's bed. While he was doing this, another police car shows up, and another policeman came over to see if help was needed.  (It wasn't, but he got in a little gentle ribbing to his "bird rescuer" buddy.)

In very short order, one...then two...then three baby pheasants were scooped up, hoisted out, and gently dumped out.  Two of them ran in the direction of Mom, and the third (perhaps slightly slow? just kidding) headed for the spare 'oom window well.  Fortunately, he avoided it, and ran to the weeds in the backyard.  I'm pretty sure that Phoebe and Phillip rounded up their wayward chicks eventually, because I saw Phoebe's head pop out of the weeds when we got the first chick out.

I profusely thanked the police officers, who both allowed that it was a nice change from their usual work.  It was a nice change from our usual morning routine, as well!