☆ One night we unfortunately lost a beautiful male ring-necked parakeet we had recently purchased from a bird show a week prior, he started showing signs of being sick a few days after introducing him to his mate, and looking back would explain the good deal the bastard gave us. Over the course of 6 years death was a natural occurrence, each one is sad, but it happens, I've always felt the obligation to actually prepare a custom box with sawdust padding for each bird we've ever lost, along with white tape on the lid with their names written on it, idk man may as well go all out when you're sitting there making a knock-off bird coffin.
I had a dedicated burial site down a trail into the woods just behind my house, it was the middle of January in the Yukon territories, (Canada) which is our coldest month of the year, and I mean fucking cold man. (Temperatures get as low as -40 degrees) Anyhow, I set off late into the day and it was really dark since we don't get much daylight up here, I had my shovel, my bearmace, my baton with a flashlight attached to it, and a pocket full of heat pads. After a 2 minute walk I come up to my spot, a little split that goes in between a set of bushes that open up into a relatively flat area, I hadn't been there for the better part of a month or so, but not to bury a bird l was just walking the trail and decided to stop by, I noticed some of the holes were dug up by either a fox or lynx, which was common since it's hard to dig deep into essentially frozen ground.
But before digging I noticed a box that was marked "toque," a bird we lost roughly 9 months prior, the box was pretty beaten up, but still sealed, I figured I'd put him and the parakeet together since I couldn't be fucked in digging two holes, but after picking up touqes box I must have been too rough or grabed it awkwardly cause when I picked it up the bottom kinda just caved in, exposing touqes 100% preserved body with absolutely no imperfections, as if he had just been buried, in the moment I wasn't as shocked as I was after the fact since in the moment I assumed it was purely due to the freezing temperature keeping him from decaying, but I buried this mad lad in fucking May, during our relatively hotter parts of the year, that in it of its self is absolutely fucking mind boggling to me now, but in the moment I didn't pay it much attention, since I was too focused on finishing up and getting back as soon as I could.
So, after digging, and having to just put him beside the other with a half open box due to me starting to really feel the cold at this point, I used a couple heat pads, lit a dart, (yes I smoked at 15 mom didn't know shh) and began burying. Around in the middle of filling the hole I heard crackling behind me, since it can litterally be anything where I lived, I grabbed my bear spray from my breast pocket and shined my baton towards the noise, after standing there for a few seconds and seeing nothing I still decided to leave the job half finished, and headed back due to me being out for too long and feeling nervous. On my way back I'd sporadically whip my flashlight up and down and side to side creating a distorted beam to any wildlife that could be in my general area, along with claping my hands while loudly going *"yup yup, hey hey, not today"* since we had a bear warning a few days prior.
As I approached the fence I had to hop over to get back to my co-op, and even right now still makes me feel spooked out, I heard an audible "heyyyyy" in a loud voice but as a whisper, essentially right the fuck behind me. The thing is, theres a clearing of about 15-20ft before the bush thicks up, and the noise was almost 5 feet off to my back left. I just kinda stood there without turning around right away, cause an animal wouldn't make that noise, I assumed it was a literal crackhead since they run rampant up here, so I grabbed my baton and turned around to see nothing, theres snow all over the ground and the sound of someone walking is loud and familiar to the ear, prior to the noise I heard nothing, and examined no tracks in the snow, being guienly confused and dumbfounded, I just went, "yo" and stood there for a solid 30 seconds.
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