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The plane pushed through wall after wall of sleet during the approach into the city. A sense of dread had accompanied me during the flight, only deepening as I made my way through the terminal. I resented returning to the city where I had spent my youth, after living on the other side of the world for what had felt like a an eternity.

After a few days, I went out to get a haircut. My thoughts was miles away, lingering over an vast expanse of water, when I heard something smack into the sidewalk. I gazed down to see a bird on its back, spatchcocked, and twitching.

The fall occurred just as kids were filing out from the local primary school and so within minutes a small chorus of children had formed, surrounded by their parents. This ring of puzzled faces looked down at the creature, not knowing what to do or say. The kids were more definitive: “Dad, she needs a vet, can we call an animal ambulance?” I removed my anorak, bent down and gently lifted the pigeon up into it. “It’s okay, sweet, the nice man will take care of her!” exclaimed one parent with a sense of relief. I had become the emergency transport for this pigeon that had just come down hard, unintentionally, as I had a short time earlier.

I walked slowly home, arms held out, with the bird tucked safely inside the garment.

I had no idea that my spontaneous decision to medivac Belinda (the name I gave my new friend) would direct me to a community of Mancunians giving up significant amounts of time to provide not only rescue services for street birds but X-rays, recovery care, and even “pigeon physio”.

I located a small container for Belinda, placed inside it with an old T-shirt, and put her inside. Every half hour or so, I’d open the box just long enough for us to awkwardly lock eyes.

Those moments of shared bewilderment marked my frantic search for what to do next. I contacted friends for advice and one proposed trying online groups, where, to my amazement, I stumbled upon a bird rehabilitation group, and submitted a request to join.

A Community Effort

With a large membership, the group follows an organic method: someone in Manchester stumbles across an hurt pigeon, a pleading post is published, then a comment section “assessment” follows. If the bird is deemed in need of an scan, someone with a veterinary contact can arrange it; if it needs therapy, a “rehabber” will offer to foster the bird.

Volunteers each have their own finely honed skills, whether it’s repairing broken wings or cleaning wounds. Their tremendous, collective effort for the pigeons of the city depends completely on kindness.

Belinda was promptly assessed with neurological problems, likely a concussion, and matched with a rehabber who would provide comfort and a regimen of careful physio. We never discovered exactly what made her to drop from above. I took up the role of avian courier once more, riding the light rail across the city with Belinda in a container on my lap so she could get the attention she required.

A New Perspective

After finding this secret pigeon “health service”, I began to feel much more positive about being back in my city. I am skeptical any of the places I had called home while away could boast anything comparable. It also dawned on me that this was not the first time I’d been connected to a pigeon aid mission: almost 20 years earlier I’d observed one plummet from the sky into the playground of my old school. Again, children circled the bird, but only one – my friend at the time – had the nerve to pick it up and take it to security.

The friend in question has since died – one of a number of companions to pass away in the years before my departure from Manchester. I came to see that this had been a major reason of what had made the return so hard.

Pigeons as Companions

Pigeons have a tradition as “emotional support” animals, especially in the North. Workers started to raise the birds because they gave them company and an reason to look up at the heavens between long shifts of underground work. During the hard times, workers on the dole also found solace in pigeons, but keeping them was seen as a sign of “social malaise”.

Nowadays, pigeons are often dismissed as stupid, unclean or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had contacted a animal doctor, who told me: “if you bring the bird here, leave that in the lot and we’ll put it down.”

That? Not her. Although not expected to ever soar , she has taken to her newly earthbound life with aplomb in a volunteer’s spare bedroom. Each happy call, often caused by her favourite treat, vegetables, feels like a demonstration in adaptability and fortitude – and I am eternally thankful to her for revealing to me a new dimension to the city I thought I knew.