Hoppy

It's just over four weeks since I released this junco from a rat trap I had negligently placed where a bird could investigate it. Sigh.

Investigate it this one did, and caught it was.

Just by luck I was in the vicinity soon enough afterwards that when I released the trap, the bird flew away.

I watched it for several days as it picked at its broken and nearly useless leg. It used it for balance in those first few days but eventually the leg disappeared. And the bird almost seems not to miss it now. It is more cautious about where it takes food to eat, but otherwise, it seems as able as any two-legged bird.

In the first days of his handicap, he hopped, and thus we started calling him Hoppy. But he moves on the ground much more smoothly now. And of course he can fly as well as any of his friends. But he's still Hoppy.