Now that I know my Maxwell is fine, and after reading Rene's hysterical Snoop story, I can now kind of laugh at what happened to us. There was a birds nest built on top of one the posts under my deck. Of course my dogs found it first and were sniffing it through the floor boards. I put a carpet on the floor over it so they would not traumatize mama bird and I delayed cleaning the deck so as not to disturb the nest. Saturday morning I let the dogs out and there were so many birds squaking that it reminded me of that old Hitchcock movie, "The Birds". Then Alivia barked her, "I'm telling on Max" bark and I suddenly remembered the... BIRD'S NEST! Ran out to find Max with a baby bird in his mouth, running up the deck steps towards me, probably trying to make a break from all the birds threatening to attack him! I'm screaming, "Drop it!" and he's completely ignoring me (and, Rene, he is NOT deaf!). So, I start trying to pry his mouth open and the poor baby bird is still moving but obviously injured. In my mind I'm thinking I am going to have to somehow humanely put the poor thing out its suffering. Max is holding on tightly, intent on bringing it in the house and also eliminating my worry of having to humanely euthanize the bird. So, I shut the gate at the top of the steps to keep him on the deck to save the two other baby birds frantically hopping around the yard terrified. Max is still refusing to give up his prize, so I grab the broom and point it at him and shake it. This scares Max and he drops the baby and runs for the door. I got Max when he was 8 weeks old and for all of his 10+ years he has been absolutely terrified of brooms and I have always tried unsuccessfully to reassure him there was nothing to be afraid of...well, so much for the past 10 years! I am sure he now thinks he has been right all along and there is a really good reason to fear the broom!

It was less than a day later that he stopped eating and became ill. I still think he caught something from the bird. He's doing fine now. The poor baby bird probably hadn't been out of the nest for more than a few minutes when it met Maxwell. Not a very successful inaugaral flight. My sweet Alivia watched the whole commotion and throughout it all, never tried to hurt either of the two other babies. The dead bird clean up was a process in itself - consisting of multiple plastic bags, wads of tissue paper and an oven mitt...don't ask.