Thankful Thursday.. Project Wildlife

A couple of weeks ago, this Cooper's Hawk was on the top of the telephone pole.  It flew over our heads to the other side of the house.  Mr. Z said that he thought it was the same one that has been hanging around the area for several weeks.  It's probably the juvenile that hangs on the fence, ever on the watch for a bird at the birdbath.  Mr. Z said that this bird had even landed on top of the jeep, on the carrier.  I think that it's the same bird that carried off a dove earlier in the year.  

Today, after Junior Cooper had a run in, probably with a window on a house a block over, or maybe a windscreen of a parked car, he got to go to Project Wildlife for rehab.   DH, who was out walking Wolfie, called me to ask what we should do.   I went as fast as I could with a - believe it or not - small fleece blanket from Audubon, to drop over the bird and scoop him up against my body to carry him home.    We rapidly called Project Wildlife, and the person answering the phone made sure that there would be someone at the facility so that we could transfer Jr. to them there.  Bless their hearts there were still staff ready to receive animals.  They were able to put Jr. Cooper on the road to recovery from his sad, addled state.  I hope he can have a better place to catch his meals, like the big park to the North or something.

This is one of my large yarn baskets cum hawk carrier, at the Project Wildlife facility.  
The belt is DH's old Docker's belt, stretched to it's limit. 
Now we know that come what may, we can transport a pretty big bird.

We hope our lovely local boy makes a full recovery.  One thing we learned is that Cooper's Hawks may not be the size of Red Tails, but they sure have lots of spunk!  I don't have so much as a feather in the basket to show, and for this I am glad.  Feathers would have meant that there were worse injuries.