I had a comment the other day asking where I was with my wildlife training

Apologies for not keeping you guys up to speed; my blogs have been on myspace instead. Feel free to read them at http://www.myspace.com/wildliferescuer

I copy an excerpt below:

This is from week 5:

Wow was it a day & a half! Ups and downs, highs and lows, easy bits, hard bits... it was mentally and physically draining.

As soon as I reached the centre I was called in to assist in the assessment of a seagull that had been admitted. It had a dislocated wing and had been shot with a pellet gun - the decision was made to put the poor bird out of its misery and it was euthanased. Not the best way to start the day but at least it wasn't suffering anymore.

Then my day got a whole lot worse... I was asked to work in the Bird Room... those of you who read last week's blog will know it went badly... very badly, in fact! I reluctantly walked through the door and started working, aiming primarily for my loyal, respectful, polite little blackbirds - they didn't let me down, they were easy to catch, easy to weigh, easy to grab again to put into a new, clean cage. Then there were the thrushes - similarly well-behaved. The canary was quick... too quick... but it didn't need weighing and some quick thinking resulted in opening the divide between its and the neighbouring clean cage so no catching necessary... then there were just the big boys left... the pigeons/doves.....

Another man had been working in the room with me and fair play, he'd done most of the birds so I had very few to do! I decided to change my technique slightly, go at it with more confidence and control the wings once I had it out of the cage...... I am so happy to say it worked!! Yay!!!

Confidence restored, I got through the rest of the day with remarkable ease!!!

Later that day, a Tawny Owl was brought in after a road accident... love owls, could've watched it all day! A pheasant was also brought in after a road accident (bloody people!) - they are one type of bird that I love. It was feared that it had broken his back because it wasn't moving its legs so it was given anti-inflammatory medicine and has 24 hours to improve or they'll put it out of its misery... my fingers are crossed for you, sweety!!

Highlight of the day... for me, this was releasing 4 collared doves. Everytime I've been there I've been helping patients recuperate or assessing patients that have just been brought in injured or sick... it felt so good to work at the other end too, with birds that had overcome their injuries/illness and were ready to return to the wild.... it was beautiful. Ok, the first one was kinda hit & miss - I didn't toss it high enough and, as it wasn't flying perfectly, it nearly hit the side of the aviary and then it went to land in the fox pen (but thought better of it luckily) but after that, it was the most amazing feeling... tossing them to the sky and watching them disappear in the sunlight... be free, little ones!!

So that's it in a nutshell! A wonderful day; I learnt so much and I came away with the most fantastic sense of achievement!! I'm halfway through the course which is kinda frightening but it means that TWR is very near to being launched - how exciting!!