Dogs have much sharper senses than we do, and Buddy's behaviour is living proof. While a teenager was playing in his basement in Nantucket, Massachusetts, USA, his dog started acting strangely, leading to a uniquely delicate rescue.
Twelve-year-old Kevin O’Connor paused his video game when he heard a high-pitched chirping sound. At first, he thought it was just a bird outside, but he changed his mind when he saw his dog, Buddy, frantically scratching at the basement walls and window.
A six-foot drop
Intrigued by this unusual behaviour, the teenager went over to the window well and was left speechless. A tiny duckling was at the very bottom, trapped after a fall of nearly 6.5 feet.
Seeing no mother duck nearby, Kevin told his father, who immediately contacted the local organisation, Nantucket Animal Rescue. In less than 15 minutes, two volunteers, Bill Bronson and Jenn McCormick, arrived at the scene to gently retrieve the little bird from its concrete prison.
A miracle at the pond
It was impossible to find the duckling's original family in the neighbourhood. So the rescuers decided to take a chance: they took the duckling, who was only a few days old, to a busy local pond, hoping that another mother duck would adopt it.
After a long wait among 200 ducks, a mother duck followed by her ducklings emerged from the bushes. "I yelled at Bill to release the duckling right away, because we have very little time before the mother leaves," Jenn McCormick told the media outlet The Dodo.
The volunteer released the little orphan, and something magical happened instantly: the mother duck rushed towards it, and the duckling ran across the water to join its new brothers and sisters. It was a perfect ending, which the O'Connor family credits entirely to Buddy the dog's perseverance.