Honouring A Dead Animal

Last night I took Grace out for her bedtime walk and instead of our normal direction she paused for a while and then asked if we could go another way. I agreed.

Half way up the street I saw a dead black bird, which I realised was a baby crow, a fledgling.

This had been a poorly bird who had fallen from the tree above. Grace and I respectfully looked at this Soul’s body. Grace behaving impeccably…she knew what I’d do…she’d brought me to the bird for this very reason.

I picked up the bird, we carried on with her walk, she walked very gently by my side, never pulling, not reacting to the strange drone sounds from the woods or the woman who walked too close.

The bird’s body felt warm in my hand, or perhaps my natural healing mojo kicked in and immediately sent healing through my palm to the Crow-Soul. As we walked further the heat begin to subside. I expressed love and respect and honouring.

At home my partner opened the door to join us on the walk and then immediately fell silent when seeing the Crow. A sad, ‘Oh’.

‘I’ve brought the body home for a burial’, I said.

She grabbed a shovel, a torch, and dug a hole under a bush that birds love to sit in. I lay the fledgling to rest, and went to find a rose quartz crystal, then on my altar my eyes rested immediately on a crow feather I had been gifted by a crow one day. I lay this feather across the fledging’s body and said a few words of honouring.

We positioned our cat statue over the burial plot as protection. Grace lay quietly watching us, respectful, gentle.

I couldn’t walk by. Someone may have kicked the body into the gutter or thrown it into a skip. A fox may have picked it up and the bird had clearly been unwell. A burial and honouring was needed, even at 10.30pm at night.

Dead crow meaning:

The dead crow meaning is potentially bringing good news and positive change to those who see it. Though different people and belief systems hold many varying ideas, it is the crow’s connection to transformation and change – of a good or bad kind – which seems to remain a common theme.

They are considered to be the messenger between the world of the dead and the living, their presence acting as a warning. They’re also thought of as a guider of souls to the afterlife. This existence between the two worlds gives them superior knowledge.”