Life & Death

The weather forecast predicted a stretch of good weather this week and sure enough the guy that hays our fields showed up. His cutter, which is a set of chains that flail the grass and consequently the ground, was set to cut shorter than previous years. This makes the predatory birds happy as it devastates the mice population by beating the ground where they make their nests, turning the slower moving rodents and babies into mincemeat.

Fields are habitat to a surprising array of birds, animals and insects. When the grass gets taken, so does the food and homes of this sector of wildlife. The average dairy consumer has no reason to make this realization, and having watched birds of prey descend within minutes of the grass being cut, I have accepted this fact, while not really giving much thought to it, knowing I would be hard pressed to give up milk and cream for my coffee if the cows didn’t get fed.

Two days ago, out of curiosity I decided to walk through our fields and take a look at how the ground faired after such a mechanized beating. It was dry and its grassy hair was shorn as close as a rookie marines heading for boot camp.

I almost missed it, but as I took a step, I saw the tiniest furry thing curled up like a shrimp in a cocktail glass. It wasn’t moving and was nestled down in one of the many tiny network of trails made in the fields understory of moss and dead grass. These well-trodden pathways become slightly depressed with the padding of many tiny mouse feet, and this is what saved this baby mouse from being pulverized. It had been low enough to escape the chains passing overhead. Mom and dad were nowhere to be found which means they were quicker than many, or quite possibly maimed or disoriented. Upon closer inspection I found one other baby equally curled up in a wad of dried moss, the remnants of a nest.

This my friends is when I channeled Mother Teresa, or the Y-chromosomes in my genetic makeup took control and my maternal instincts came to the fore. With no thought to the absurdity of it, I gathered up the two furry mouse pups determined that I would rescue them from starvation, or becoming hors d’oeuvres for the next crow, raven, hawk, eagle, owl or turkey vulture that spied them from above.

I say absurd because I have mouse traps throughout the basement and have no qualms about offing the little buggers while lying in bed late at night listening to them scurry around in the walls. But this was different. These little guys were totally exposed and defenseless. They’re eyes weren’t even open yet and they were just lying there in the hot sun. I mean come on, could you leave them there!?

So I gathered up my little charges and became their surrogate mother for two days. Without Googling “caring for abandoned baby mice” I went on instinct and created a mixture of milk, cream (fat protein), and a little sugar which I administered in a makeshift syringe out of a little plastic bottle with a fine needle like tube attachment. I use it to apply fine lines of slip on my ceramic work and it was the only thing I could come up with on short notice.

Every two hours I would try to get them to nurse, heating the milky concoction and testing it’s hot or coldness on my inner wrist like a well seasoned mom. I could never tell if their increased flailing was due to excitement over getting nourished, or I was drowning them and they were gasping for breath. I don’t think it was the latter, but after two days of intermittent care, they died.

I have since Googled and learned that it takes nearly non-stop weaning to impersonate a mother mouse, but it doesn’t assuage the loss of a bond formed in so short a time with two furry orphans. Their plight offered me the chance to leave the preoccupation with my daily thoughts, and by doing so those tiny creatures gave me a powerful gift, and the reminder that when you give of yourself, you get so much more in return.