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T pushed through successive sheets of sleet on its descent into the city. A growing unease had accompanied me during the journey, intensifying as I shuffled through the arrivals hall. I felt bitter over returning to the town where I had grown up, after residing on the opposite end of the world for what had felt like a lifetime.

After a short while, I ventured out to get a haircut. My mind was miles away, lingering over an sea, when I heard something strike the ground. I gazed down to see a pigeon on its side, splayed out, and convulsing.

The crash occurred just as children were filing out from the local grade school and so within moments a little crowd of little ones had formed, surrounded by their mums and dads. This ring of confused faces looked down at the bird, unsure what to say or do. The kids were more definitive: “Papa, she needs hospital, can we call an ambulance?” I removed my jacket, crouched down and scooped the pigeon up into it. “No problem, sweet, the kind man will take care of her!” remarked one parent with a sigh of relief. I had become the emergency transport for this pigeon that had just come down hard, unintentionally, as I had a couple of days prior.

I made my way home, arms held out, with the bird nestled inside the jacket.

Little did I know that my spontaneous decision to medivac Belinda (the name I chose for my avian patient) would lead me to a web of city dwellers giving up significant amounts of their time to provide not only ambulances for street birds but diagnostic imaging, recovery care, and even “avian physiotherapy”.

I found a small container for Belinda, prepared it with an old shirt, and put her inside. Every short while, I’d peek inside just long enough for us to make brief contact.

Those moments of mutual bewilderment interrupted my desperate search for what to do from there. I phoned friends for advice and one proposed trying Facebook, where, to my amazement, I stumbled upon a local pigeon rescue group, and put in a request to become a member.

An Anarchic Model

With a large membership, the group operates on an organic system: someone in Manchester stumbles across an hurt pigeon, a heartfelt post is made, then a comment section “triage” takes place. If the bird is deemed in need of an scan, someone with a veterinary contact can arrange it; if it needs physio, a “rehabilitator” will step forward to care for the bird.

Rehabbers each have their own finely honed skills, whether it’s mending broken wings or treating wounds. Their tremendous, cooperative effort for the pigeons of the city depends completely on kindness.

Belinda was quickly assessed with neurological problems, likely a blow to the head, and placed with a rehabber who would give comfort and a program of careful physio. We never discovered exactly what caused her to drop from above. I resumed the role of avian courier once more, riding the tram across the city with Belinda in a container on my lap so she could get the treatment she required.

Rediscovering Home

After finding this hidden pigeon “health service”, I began to feel much differently about being back in my home town. I question any of the places I had resided in while away could have anything remotely similar. It also occurred to me that this was not the first time I’d been involved in a pigeon recovery: almost 20 years earlier I’d witnessed one plummet from the sky into the schoolyard of my high school. Again, children gathered around the bird, but only one – my friend at the time – had the gall to scoop it up and take it to a safe place.

The individual has since died – one of several friends to die in the years before my exit from Manchester. I realised that this had been a major reason of what had made the return so painful.

Pigeons as Companions

Pigeons have a longstanding role as “emotional support” animals, especially in the North. Workers started to care for the birds because they gave them solace and an excuse to stare at the sky between long shifts of subterranean gloom. During the economic downturn, workers on the unemployment also found a distraction in pigeons, but keeping them was considered a sign of “social malaise”.

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

That? Not her. Although unlikely to ever take to the skies , she has adapted to her newly grounded life with grace in a volunteer’s home. Each satisfied call, often caused by her favourite treat, peas, feels like a example in resilience and resilience – and I am forever grateful to her for unveiling for me a new dimension to the city I was familiar with.