Did you know that over a million animals perish each year due to being entrapped or ingesting litter?
Bright-colored litter would look irresistible for birds, while plastics often look like jellyfish for some marine animals.
Some animals can also be injured because of broken bottles or glasses. These are just some of the many causes of death caused by litter.
But buckets can be dangerous too.
Frank Floridia of Strong Island Animal Rescue League posted a viral video of him trying to rescue a trapped deer.
The deer was already disoriented because of the extremely cold water. As much as it tried to go back to the shore, she wasn’t able to do so because couldn’t even find her way out of the water.
Her head was stuck in a bucket.
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Frank received a call about a deer with a bucket stuck on her head. When he came to the location, the poor deer was already in the water.
The rescuer needed to act fast.
Once the bucket gets filled with water, the deer would drown.
Frank immediately took his vest and boots off and jumped into the water. The water was icy cold, but Frank had to do it.
The deer was confused and kept on going further into the water.
That’s when Frank realized that it would be hard to just swim alone and grab the scared deer.
So, he improvised.
Just then, Frank and his companion saw a boat.
He shouted and asked the person in the boat to go and get him. He also pointed to the deer.
The man was kind enough to help Frank.
Frank asked the man if he could bring his boat closer so he could grab the bucket.
There were multiple unsuccessful tries.
The deer couldn’t see, but she was still alert and was scared.
Frank was able to grab the handle of the bucket. However, the deer struggled, and then she went under the water.
At first, they thought it had gotten worse.
We can hear Frank saying that the deer went down in the water, then the man yelled, and they saw the deer again, now without the bucket.
At last, the deer was free!
The bucket had slid off.
The men cheered and said that the deer could swim back. They went back to where the bucket was to retrieve it.
As responsible people, they wouldn’t leave the bucket there knowing some other animal can be in danger because of it.
The deer was still there.
She was just swimming in circles.
“I bear-hugged her against the boat and he drove us back to shore. As we got back to shore I was still holding her on the front of the boat,” said Frank to abc7. “She seemed very calm – she knew she was being helped.”
Once they reached the shore, the deer struggled a bit. She was letting Frank know that she wanted to go on her own.
She did. She ran, and this made the men smile. Let this be a reminder for all of us that animals can suffer if we don’t become responsible for our trash.
See Frank rescue this helpless deer in the video below!
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