Trouble for Nitnoy

For those of you not in the know, Nitnoy (or the Nit) is my boss's pet bird. Specifically it is my boss's pigeon. According to my boss, Nitnoy is Turkish for "little bit." I have no idea if that's true. "Why on earth would someone want a pet pigeon?" you ask. Good question. Here goes.

Once upon a time, my boss (I'll call him George) was working in San Francisco. He does it regularly. I've done it myself a couple times. He'll fly down Monday morning, work all week, and fly home Friday afternoon. Well, one time he had just finished a customer in downtown San Francisco and had to rush across the Bay Bridge to make his flight out of Oakland, which is no easy task on a good day. On the sidewalk just outside the building, a crowd was gathered and he just had to know why. It turns out they were looking at an abandoned baby pigeon on the sidewalk and wondering what to do with it. Most people would have volunteered a pet cat to take care of things, but George, for reasons known only to himself, decided to save the pathetic little thing and scooped it up. Not knowing what else to do with it, he stuck it in his carry-on bag when he got to the airport. There this bird sat for 3 hours or so until he got back to Portland. This means the bird sat in a bag under somebody's chair for a couple hours without making a peep, and apparently without making a mess of the bag either. This also means that he got to ride through an x-ray machine that was several times stronger than the average vet would prescribe. I suppose a baby bird, either dead or alive, is not really much of a threat, even in the hands of Osama Bin Laden himself. However, I'm pretty sure a clothing bag is not an approved pet carrier and an uninspected pigeon is right out. Anyway, nobody stopped George or the pigeon and they both made it back to Portland just fine. I'm sure George's wife was thrilled.

To put this all in perspective, George is a nice guy, but not exactly a softy by most standards. He's got a Harley, and even rode it up and down New England last year to attend a biker rally -- at 60 years old. In the past he's gone back and forth across the country hitching rides on freight trains. Most of his stories of growing up in Jersey involve some friend with a colorful Jersey nickname and the mischievous or downright illegal things they got away with. All this makes it that much more disconcerting to see him fawning over a damn pigeon.

To his credit, a pigeon that doesn't live in a dumpster is actually kind of a pretty bird. The Nit has very shiny feathers that shimmer different colors depending on the light, and he apparently spends a good deal of time grooming them. He's very friendly, and after he's decided you're one of the family, he has no problem sitting on your arm or your head or whatever you'll let him get away with. He gets along great with the cat. And most of the year he live in a hard-side pet carrier with no door that has been nailed up under George's eaves. (Ironic: he rode in the plane in a bag, but lives in a pet carrier.)

George tried several times to release the Nit into the wilds of the Portland area, but it never worked. He even took him to a park full of pigeons, but the Nit wasn't interested in them at all. Eventually, George resigned himself to owning a pet pigeon.

One time, when a skimmer boat was cleaning the canal behind George's house, Nitnoy flew out and sat on the front window of the boat for the rest of the afternoon. When the boat got back to the other end of the lake, the bird was obviously a pet, so the workmen put it in an animal trap until word of mouth in the neighborhood tracked down George. It even made their community paper.

Nitnoy lives what appears to be a pretty good life for a pigeon. He has his own personal shelter, people to roost on and a regular diet. His one problem is the local hawk that likes to harass him. This has been going on for ages apparently, but yesterday the hawk got lucky. George had just returned from another California trip, and right after he got home, he and his wife heard the bird cooing in the back yard, but it wasn't right. They got outside just in time to scare the hawk up into a tree and away from the Nit. Nitnoy was very hurt, but still alive. George's wife apparently had to talk him out of getting his shotgun and blowing the hawk to smithereens. I'm guessing the neighbors should feel lucky. Anyway, George got his pigeon to the vet quickly enough that, 10 stitches up the breast later, it looks like the bird will probably be okay.

This has to be the luckiest pigeon alive. So far he's survived parental abandonment, hours stuffed in a bag, an unhealthy dose of x-ray, a cat, and a hawk. What next?