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Post by hookedup on Aug 23, 2022 18:52:29 GMT -5
With age comes wisdom. I won't even go into the story where I knocked out, and then revived via CPR, a duck after throwing a stick at it. Honest mistake. Really. I still feel bad. Shoot, I feel bad for the duck.
But, I know what you mean. Kids don't think things through to the end result. I know I didn't way too often.
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jerryk
Captain
When not online I'm likely on Knot Online
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Post by jerryk on Aug 23, 2022 19:06:13 GMT -5
The duck was fine in the end. Was swimming upside down for a short time, but revived to live another day.
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Post by Twisted on Aug 24, 2022 9:59:47 GMT -5
Oh come on, that story is too good not to tell! Giving a duck CPR, sounds like an SNL skit!!
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jerryk
Captain
When not online I'm likely on Knot Online
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Post by jerryk on Aug 24, 2022 13:42:22 GMT -5
I pray the statue of limitations has run out since this was more than 45 years ago and I was in my early teens at most, maybe even upper single digits in age. And my parents are now gone so I am free to speak I guess. This is WAY off the topic of this post already, but since you asked…
On a northern Michigan lake a buddy and I were along the shore and started throwing stones and chunks of bark and small sticks into a group of ducklings and their mom who were already too conditioned that people throwing stuff at them usually meant an easy meal. We kept ourselves entertained “faking out” the small ducklings with each foodless throw which they chased only to be disappointed with, and at one point I grabbed a small stick, about a foot long and no more than ½ inch in diameter, and threw it at the mother duck with a sideways fling. Imagine a Frisbee rotating in flight…the stick was rotating like that and one end of the stick came from behind the mother duck and clocked her right in the back of the head. I swear I meant only to land it on her back to see what she would do, and it really wasn’t a hard throw or intended to hurt her. In what seemed like slow motion, two panicked boys saw the mother duck flip upside down in the water and kick feet in the air while her head remained underwater for what seemed like an eternity. Then the feet stopped moving. Oh, crap. Did anyone see us? Visions of a visit by the Michigan DNR to enforce the law came into my head. Visions of a family of ducklings now orphaned without their mother. Visions of me orphaned when my parents found out and disowned me, or killed me outright as my punishment for wildlife harassment.
We couldn’t rip our shoes off fast enough to wade into the water and save the mother duck. My buddy and I pulled the duck ashore and held her head up but it was limp. No visible damage, but clearly the bird was out cold, if not dead. We commenced all manner of revival attempts: wing flapping, gently holding her head upright hoping she would come to, and finally trying breast compressions (not easy to do on a bird I learned, as the feathers moved a lot and it was hard to tell if we were doing anything productive). Eventually the bird revived a bit and could hold her head up, but didn’t attempt to get away from us yet…probably dizzy and with a major headache! A few more minutes of stabilizing the patient and looking over our shoulders to see who might have seen the commotion and the mother duck finally jumped free from us and quacked to get her brood back in line, heading them out to sea away from us awful boys. Embarrassed by our stupidity, and slightly proud of our successful resuscitation, and still worried that someone saw us and would report us, two boys learned a lesson that stuck with me for the rest of my life.
To bring this back to boating, always be prepared for anything because even those things that you don’t intend can happen on the water. If someone is hurt, do your best to treat them—you probably will end up helping them even if you aren't a doctor. And don’t give the law anything to get you busted for.
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