By Elizabeth Young | Founder, Executive Director
Your support saved these birds lives.
On November 28th, Palomacy received word that 28 domestic Ringneck doves (all descended from five) needed rescue as their person, a resident of the All Star Trailer Park, could no longer care for them. They were all living outside, crowded into unsafe cages so it was 911.
The thing is, Palomacy foster homes and aviaries are always full up. The number of birds needing rescue is never-ending and our rescue is small. We don't have a sanctuary or a shelter facility though we very much need one. With every available foster space filled with the 130 birds already in our care, we didn't have any place to house a flock of 28 additional birds. The one shelter in the area that accepts birds was maxed out with a recent intake of 20 ducks.
We networked and scrambled to try and find safe places for the doves to land. We got a couple of leads for potential aviaries and our current dove fosters looked to see how they could squeeze in a few more.
On December 2nd, super volunteer Jill (an all star in her own right) loaded up her car with carriers and made the 100 mile (one way) trip to go get the doves. We didn't know where they were going to go, only that they had to be rescued. While she was making the drive, dove foster volunteers Liese, Faye and Emma were preparing to fit a couple in here and there and I was working on the aviary leads.
We never know what we'll find when we head out on a rescue. The All Star doves were living in terrible, unsafe and overcrowded conditions. And all except for one little splay-legged dovenow named Jade, were in perfect shape. Strong, healthy birds, They are what we call a "survival of the fittest" flock. Birds that were injured, ill or weak died while the strong survived. Some had gotten out now and then and been caught and killed but miraculously the cats, raccoons, raptors and rats hadn't yet killed them all in their their flimsy cages.
Jill was welcomed and helped by Genevieve, the kind neighbor who had been feeding the All Star doves and who reached out to find help for them. They worked carefully to catch and transfer each dove from the cages to carriers, under the curious watch of the cat locals. And then another miracle. One of our aviary leads became a real possibility! Robin, referred to us by a local wildlife rescuer, had a vacant aviary, was home and willing to quickly complete our screening process! By the time Jill had all the doves loaded up, I had a wonderful potential fosterer for her to go meet!
I have no idea what we would have done if not for Robin's big, wonderful aviary and her immediate willingness to help us help these doves. She and husband Dean welcomed Jill and the All Stars. Together they reviewed Palomacy's foster policies and assessed the aviary for safety enhancements the doves would need. A couple hours later, 16 incredibly lucky doves, who had never been outside of small cages, we're stretching their wings and exploring their great big new foster aviary while their 12 friends rode along with Jill heading to the Bay Area to be fostered at her home in Sunol and in our Andy's aviary in San Jose!
In the two and a half months since this rescue began, volunteers helped to catch, band, photograph, name and enter all 28 into our adoptable birds database so that they appear on all the pet search sites. So far, nine of the All Stars- Piper, Pumpkin, Bossman, Georgia, Beau, Jasper, Ruby, Willow and Jade- have found their forever home with amazing adopter Angela! We still have 17 beautiful All Star doves eager to be adopted (in addition to the 20 doves we were already fostering) and though we no longer have the use of (traveling) Robin's aviary, we're making do with another smaller aviary (also heroically wrangled by Jill!) and a lot of creative dove tetris.
We are though, as you can imagine, still even fuller than overfull and so in urgent need of adopters (for both doves and pigeons) in the Northern California area and we know of lots of adoptable birds all over the country so we can help you to help birds wherever you might be. Learn more here.
Please help us to continue this life-saving, rescue gap-closing work! Adopt a lovely bird or two or ten! Foster, volunteer, donate. Share this story and your love for birds. They need our help and we need yours. Thank You!
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By Elizabeth Young | Founder, Executive Director
By Elizabeth Young | Founder, Executive Director
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