September, 30th, 2006
After a quick cup of coffee at first light, it was time for a kayak paddle. It is an easy walk pulling my kayak on wheels, down to Aqua Hedionda. One of the main reasons we selected our site to build Herons' House on, was it's awesome lagoon view and walking proximity to the lagoon.
I've kayaked over 100 times in the lagoon (and often in the ocean) and each trip is different from the last.
I could tell you, almost unbelievably, about the time when hundreds of stingrays rocked our kayak on our wedding morning, Julie was with me as we were watching the sunrise over the lagoon, and on our life as a couple together.
I wrote about my paddle last week. Paddling
Today, it was a pelican rescue.
As I approached the brown pelican its head was awkwardly cocked to one side and was immobile. When I came closer, I could see the fish hook stuck to his bill and wrapped around his wing and one foot. His bill was tethered to his wing and he had apparently been struggling for a long time as he was exhausted and scared.
I thought about leaving him there and calling animal rescue but it was 7am on a Saturday and I was sure that no volunteer would answer and that it would be several hours before anyone could or would attempt a rescue in the mud flats.
I tried to untangle the wire and remove the hook from his bill but that was unsuccessful. I decided to hoist him into the kayak. The pelican practically jumped into my kayak and nestled between my feet. I stopped a water ski boat, they had a knife, and we cut the fishing wire free from the bill and feet, we cut the hook with cutting pliers and removed it from his bill, but it's wing was still very tangled in the fishing wire. The pelican stretched his neck and his wings then laid back down between my feet. It was not going to fly away so I made the decision to rescue the pelican and take it ashore.
Julie came down from the house and helped me with the pelican, we took it home, made contact with animal rescue and drove the pelican down to Sea World.
If you are a fisherman, please be careful with your fishing wire, lures, hooks. Clean up after yourselves and don't discard lines that you have cut away in the water or shore. This young baby pelican was in serious trauma because of such carelessness.
