The Old Man and me do decide there is nothing for it but to try to release it from inside the house. There have been many a tradesman who do nearly come to blows with The Old Man over his insistence that things be done a certain way. And in this case he insisted that we be able to get at the extractor fan outlet, which is hidden by a cupboard, rather than being walled in.
And so it be that I do empty everything including a kitchen sink .... (well, no, not quite)... from said cupboard and The Old Man sets about unscrewing its backboards. Next, he removes the insulation... (paff... pthah... archoo!) .... which do leave us staring at a coil of extractor hose running up from the floor below. Slowly The Old Man disconnects the hose from its solid junction and I hurriedly fix some paper over the junction pipe ... else all will be lost if the fledgling plummets downwards. Finally, we do peer into the hose and see for ourselves the feathered bum of a small bird standing on the bend before the grille.
Well, I do try a small box held underneath the end of the coil... a bit of judicious wiggling and shaking. No good. A careful hand creeping up the pipe... just causes the bird to shuffle out of reach towards the grille. In the end we cover what gaps and remaining insulation we can....and carefully close the cupboard door.
I am scratching me head wondering what to do next, when The Old Man shouts that the chirping is now very LOUD. We carefully open the cupboard door... and there on the floor is a small but perfectly formed sparrow.
Long story shortened... I do manage to catch it and decide that The Old Man's advice to put it out of the window onto the roof is perhaps not the thing to do. I go downstairs and into the yard and put it into the thick shrubby clematis that covers the house wall under the nest boxes. The little thing do immediately plummet into the shrubbery under the clematis stems. But tis the best I can do. The clematis heaves with sparrows on occasion and I think it must form a landing platform for the the fledglings who manage a more orthodox entry into the big wide world.
Oh. Yes. How did it get into the pipe in the first place? It must have bounced along the top of the house wall as far as the hose... where The Old Man do spot that something have made a nice raggedy hole. Some years ago we did have a slight mouse problem....
And, yes, 36 hours later, there still be healthy chirping from the shrubbery and an adult bird in attendance.... so we live in hopes we did the best we could.
Next step... a new hose perhaps.
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