In late October of last year, I was spending time with my family at our home in Morris County. It was morning and we were sitting downstairs together reading the newspaper. Suddenly, we heard a strange noise coming from above the flue in our fireplace. First, we thought it was a bat, and then we decided it was a small bird. We tried to open and close the flue in hopes that the bird would fly down into the base of the fireplace and we could release it safely outside. Naturally, the bird was too afraid to fly down through the opening. After quite some time, the bird finally flew down unharmed. It was a beautiful, male Eastern Bluebird! We were so relieved that he was okay.
Next, we (my dad) gently threw a towel over the bird and we moved him outside to release him from our deck. The bluebird flew away into a birch tree in our backyard!
While it was an exciting morning and fascinating to see a bluebird so close, it was a very traumatic experience for the bird. To prevent this type of incident from happening, you can bird-proof your chimney by installing a chimney cap.
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