looking at the awful injury that yyoungs mouse has sustained from fighting made me think of some of the horrible things that have happened to mine.Two stick out in my memory.A rat that I had loose and shut the door on her tail.The flesh bit came clean off like a sleeve ,leaving an entire tail of bone.As the tails part of the spine I thought she would die.The bone tail shrivelled up and dropped off leaving me with a healthy but tail less rat.I have a group of feral pigeons drop in daily to pick up the leftover seeds that I spill.I came home oneday and one was sitting on the front doorstep.It allowed me to pick it up.Its wing was broken and under the wing was a horrendous wound that revealed its internal parts.I should have killed it but was moved by the fact that it had struuggled to my house on foot and although wild was willing to throw itself at my mercy.I powdered the wound with antibiotics and within a week improvement was obvious.The pigeon lived 6 years as a flightless bird in my garden and I now have a great respect for the common town pigeon.