Steve: A Fighter and An Inspiration

Steve, after two weeks of healing. 

Alternate title: The Power of Prayer and Antibiotics

Because this story could not possibly continue to get any more ridiculous, shortly after I spoke with Tom and decided to keep Steve as a permanent resident of the Little House On the Ridge, he sustained a serious (likely squirrel-induced) eye injury.

Luckily I had antibiotic ophthalmic ointment on hand, and was able to start treating the eye right away, but for the first couple days things were looking bleak for Steve. The eye injury was very bad, and although it improved from its original state of completely swollen shut and full of blood, it vacillated by the hour between "I think he'll make it " and "I think this is getting worse." Steve became depressed, stopped eating, and would tremble now and then. I was worried we'd lose him, but not being in a position to perform heroics for a stray pigeon, all I could do was continue to treat the eye the best I could, force feed him, and pray.

I prayed night and day for Steve, praying that God who is by nature the Restorer would restore this little bird. I medicated his eye two and three times a day. I shoved chicken pellets down his little beak. I worried. And I prayed.

And Steve, bless him, turned around. After two days he started eating on his own, his eye started to look a little less horrific, and that bird got FEISTY. He absolutely hates me now for picking him up and putting goo in his eye multiple times a day, and it's all I can do to catch him without getting pecked to death or swatted in the face with a wing. That Steve. He's a fighter. If anyone has the will to survive, it's that bird.

The Pigeon Penthouse! We've added a single roof, back and side walls, and a perching shelf and it's almost ready for move-in! 

Steve will likely be blind in that eye for the rest of his life, but despite it all he's bound and determined to beat the odds. From flying Fair Hill to Bucks County, to getting stabbed in the eye by a squirrel, I don't think there's anything that bird can't beat. And I can't wait to get him into his new pigeon palace, which is almost complete!