We Saved a Pelican

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Selassie I

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Haole
It was the day after Thanksgiving last week. My parents, sons, and their girlfriends were all together with us. Everything was fine until one of the girlfriends comes in the house crying like a baby with alligator tears. She's spotted a pelican that she says has a knife stuck in it.

So, my son (with the crying girlfriend) and I go out and see this pelican struggling bad over in the mangroves. We take a kayak over,,, and manage to bring this injured bird back to the dock.

It doesn't have a knife stuck into it. Instead, it has a big fishing lure with 3 treble hooks snagged in his wing and that big flappy thing of a neck that pelicans have. This poor guy had his head spun back like an owl because the hooks were pulling his head back because of the way it was hooked in his wing. This little dude was totally fucked.

I managed to get the hook out of his neck thing to allow him to hold his head normally... but the hooks that were in his wing needed some special skill. Here's a shot of my boys thinking the worst. The pelican is in the net.

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Here's a shot of the moment that we found out that the Marine Bird People were on their way over to help.


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Here he is riding out in the car with the Marine Bird People.


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About 2 hours later we hear the doorbell... it's the Marine Bird People. They brought us back the big fishing lure that they were able to remove from the pelican. You can see the barbs that they cut off so that they could remove it from the bird's wing. We're gonna put it in a frame or box of some kind. It made our day when they dropped in unannounced like that with the great news that they were able to get that thing out of him.


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This is a shot before they released him today!


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RamFan503

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Very cool my bruthuh. The little creatures out there sometimes need our help.

But why was you fishing for pelicans? And what kind of stuffing would you use?
 

Selassie I

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  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
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Very cool my bruthuh. The little creatures out there sometimes need our help.

But why was you fishing for pelicans? And what kind of stuffing would you use?


Hahaha

We were surprised at how big he was. We joked about it with the girls... but they didn't think it was funny when we said he might fit perfectly into the turkey fryer.
 

RamFan503

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Hahaha

We were surprised at how big he was. We joked about it with the girls... but they didn't think it was funny when we said he might fit perfectly into the turkey fryer.
I figured there had to be some talk of having a different bird for Thanksgiving. Not sure how you could not.
 

OregonRamsFan

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Good job saving the Pelican! It took a good heart to do what you did. There are good humane folks out there like yourselves doing good work!

I also have helped a Pelican. It had fallen off a streetlight above a highway during a wind storm. I stopped in the road with my hazards on and gathered him up and found a quiet place out of the wind. He was just a little dazed from the fall. It was amazingly light weight! It was a very nice experience.
 

Memento

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Beautiful. Good on you to help the poor pelican (even if it's a known pigeon-eater).