On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 03:54:40 -0800 (PST), Helen
wrote:
: A friend of mine found this beautiful cardinal in distress. This
: gorgeous cardinal found comfort in my friend's hand. "I found him
: sitting in my driveway and picked him up. He squawked a little and
: then settled into my hand. He acted dizzy and unbalanced, but didn't
: have any visible injuries. I held him for a half hour in the sunshine,
: for warmth, and he seemed to fall asleep, but then he had a seizure
: and died in my hands. I buried him in my backyard where he will go
: back to the earth like he's meant to."
: Taken with a cell phone camera by my friend, the pics are not Bret-
: quality, but I thought I'd share them with everyone as the story is
: indeed a heart-melter.
:
: http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/r... 716751_n.jpg
:
: http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/r... 4010469_n.jpg

At least your friend was able to ensure that the cardinal didn't spend his
final minutes in the claws of a cat or a hawk.

It seems that cardinals aren't as shy around people as most songbirds are.
I've seen them build nests in very accessible and seemingly dangerous places.
One year a cardinal family lived in a bush right outside my daughter's kitchen
window.

Once I had to help get a cardinal out of our building at work. It's an
old-style City Hall with a rather cavernous inside, so it wasn't a
particularly simple task. I finally chased him into a fairly small office and
closed the door. I opened a window so he could get out, but even then he
wasn't sure he wanted to leave. It was dark and snowing, so he may have been
conflicted between his fear of being trapped inside and his reluctance to
abandon the warm room. I finally grabbed him and released him outside the
window. Throughout all this, of course, I had no camera handy.

Bob