It looked like a giant puffball mushroom at the edge of the driveway. I saw it and managed to drive around it, then Jim and I went to investigate. Instead of a mushroom, it was a bird.  Jim took a picture on his phone and looked it up – it was a quail.  

Which made him worried. It’s not really native to our area and it has been domesticated to be bulkier and not fly as well.

Jim assumed that it was an escaped pet and was determined to catch it and try to find the owner on facebook.

So, while he watched it, I went inside to get a box.  Then back inside to get a bigger box.  We chased it around the next door neighbor’s yard and the neighbor across the street saw us and came over.  We weren’t making much progress except to find that it could fly – not well, but well enough to avoid us.

The across-the-street-neighbor said that the neighbor-on-the-corner raised quail and it must have escaped.  Across-the-street got the attention of On-the-corner – who had just gotten home – and reported what was going on.  On-the-corner came over and said it was really his wife that raised them – and that she may have let this one loose on purpose. It was violent to the other birds – he called her to confirm.

Meanwhile, Jim and I are still trying to trap it and Across-the-street is talking about “circle of life”.

His kids have startled it to the backyard of Next-door – who we haven’t seen in a few days – and On-the-Corner reluctantly follows.  Then he reports that it has vanished into the undergrowth.  

He’s done at that point and Across-the-street and his kids leave as well.  I go into our backyard and Jim goes into the Next-door yard to try and find it – but no luck.   It’s gone and on its own.

My big hearted Jim is now heartbroken.  He so badly wanted to save this bird that likely can’t save itself.  We have lots of wildlife in the neighborhood and some of them are predators.

But, even if we could catch it, we’re not set up to keep a bird – even really in the short term.  And that’s if we can find someone to take in a bird long term that has a violent history.

We haven’t seen the bird since and we’re assuming that it didn’t make it. 

We’re not happy with the On-the-corner neighbor anyway – he yells at his kids constantly – and this seemed heartless from his family. 

Jim’s empathy has been in overdrive since we lost Talbot – he was quietly distraught and went to bed early that night.

It wasn’t really about the quail.  Just the latest in a line of animals and people we can’t save.