I was on North Padre Island enjoying the beach on SuperBowl Sunday. As I was leaving for the day, I spotted this poor great blue heron pacing back and forth in the surf zone, in obvious distress. It had something man-made stuck in its throat and was trying to spit it out, but it wouldn't come out. The object looks like something glass (a bottle?) with a rag dangling out of the end. I raced up to the ranger's checkpoint at the Padre Island National Seashore/Malaquite Beach entrance and reported the incident, and offered to take the ranger back to the spot where the bird was. She stated that she couldn't leave her post but "would see what she could do." She also stated that it sounded like some type of fishing equipment the bird had tried to swallow. I drove away feeling sick that nothing might be done to help this poor bird. Not knowing how to handle large wild birds, I was reluctant to try help it myself and felt pretty helpless.

Surely if there was ever an argument for cleaning up Texas beaches and enforcing littering laws, these photos have to be it! I just wanted to raise awareness on how our own carelessness can really impact innocent creatures.