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Burnham
Hovercraft Home Page > Burnham Hovercraft
News Archive
December
2, 2006
Injured
cygnet helped by rescuers
from BARB and Secret World
An
injured cygnet which had swallowed a metre-long length of rope
has been helped by a team of rescuers from Secret World and the
Burnham-On-Sea hovercraft group.
Highbridge-based
Secret World Wildlife Centre contacted BARB, the charity that
runs the hovercraft, for help when the distressed bird was spotted
with a length of thick twine hanging from its mouth on a lake
at Dunball Wharf, near Bridgwater.
 BARB's
inshore lifeboat was taken by road to the lake and launched with
three crew members onboard in a bid to retrieve the injured bird.
Secret World's Ellie West said: "After several minutes trying
to capture the cygnet, we managed to retrieve him and could see
that it had swallowed a long length of bailer twine. Without wanting
to hurt the bird and cause it any distress, we took straight it
to our vets, Quantock Veterinary Hospital in Bridgwater, who anaesthetised
the bird and used a special endoscopy camera to see how far the
twine had gone."
 "Sadly,
the bird had swallowed the whole line of twine, about a metre
in all, and this had got severely caught around its rib cage,
causing it some considerable damage internally. The twine is quite
rough, especially to soft internal organs."
"Sadly,
the bird has had to be put down, but at least with BARB's help
it is no longer suffering."
BARB
has been involved in several animal rescues in recent years; helping
swans at Apex Leisure Park at Combwich, and two dogs trapped in
mud at Brean in July 2004.
RELATED
LINKS:
September
2006 rescue of a swan at Combwich
July
2006 rescue of a swan at Combwich Lake
Official
BARB Web site home page
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