I had a pretty awful experience earlier this morning. I was walking up our roadwhich has a small field with trees next to it, and came across a woodpigeon in distress. It had been cut badly on the wing, and it looked like it had a problem with its lefg too. I moved it to what I hope was a safe place in a bush tucked away behind some trees, but now I think that perhaps I left it exposed if a cat had caught its scent. I hope not, because it looked like it could have survived if it was given a chance to recover.

Do you think I did the right thing?

It is very difficult to know what's best to do with things like this. Usually it is best to let nature take it course & what you did at the time was a spontaneous reaction. I'm sure the pigeon would die anyway of it's injuries so even if you could have taken it to a vet they most probably would have put it to sleep. So I wouldn't worry. These things happen.

Yes, a difficult choice you had there. I think that if you had tried to do more for it, the stress of being handled by a human might have killed it anyway. You did your best under the circumstances, I think.

Kingfisher

It is very difficult to tell what do with an injured animal. I think you did the right thing moving it away from the road, and giving it a chance to either die in peace or the best chance of surviving.

It's very likely that the pidgeon wouldnt have survived either way as with injuries to animals it won't be able to find food and is vulnerable to attack. As Kingfisher says, it is also a wild bird so being taken home and handled by a human wouldn't have been fair on it either.

It sounds bad, i know, but i have never had a second thought about 'necking' injured birds. The worst one was quite recently when i had to 'destroy' a badly injured Juvenile Great-black backed Gull. They are pretty tuff birds believe me! Not nice but better than it suffering a slow death.

I think you did the right thing Riana.