Australian police snatches back pet from baby kangaroo-stealing eagle

Two different types of birds attempted to snatch baby animals in Australia. One succeeded, the other bird failed.

The failed bird, a wedge-tailed eagle, made the mistake of trying to steal a joey owned by an Australian police who chased the eagle and got back his pet. It was the second rescue for the baby kangaroo, which was first rescued by Constable Scott Mason of Cue Police Station in March after the mother roo was run over by a car.

Mason took the joey from the dead marsupial’s pouch and raised it as his own “baby.” The video of the two, showing Cuejoe climbing inside the cop’s T-shirt and staying inside it as his human pouch, became viral with over 2.8 million hits.

The Washington Post reports that the joey was hopping around a gum tree at the station’s yard in Burringurrah when the eagle snatched Cuejoe and flew with the baby roo over a fence toward the bushland. Mason chased the bird which could not really fly very far with a heavy animal – Cuejoe is already five months old and weighed 10 pounds.

The cop expected the eagle to stop soon and attempt to eat a little of its prey. Mason found the eagle and another eagle pecking on his joey. He chased them and the two eagles flew, while Cuejoe hopped off. However, the bird did not give up and attempted to snatch again the baby roo but failed.

Mason found a puncture wound on Cuejoe’s chest and face which he, using his paramedic knowledge, stitched since the nearest vet was five hours away. Cuejoe is now recovering and spared from being the next meal of baby eagles as what happened to a cat in Pittsburgh last week.

However, Fudge, a Chihuahua living in Kilsyth, Melbourne, was not as lucky as Cuejoe and likely suffered the same fate as the Pittsburgh cat. The Telegraph reports that Heather Sinden, the owner of Fudge, let her pet out to poo on Wednesday afternoon when a crow suddenly swooped and flew away with the four-month old dog.

Sinden usually keeps the dog inside the house because she is aware of the danger of bird that surround her property, and Fudge was just allowed out to answer the call of nature when the owner heard the dog’s cry, says Melinda Pride, Sinden’s daughter, reports The Telegraph.

Sinden, who is battling lung cancer, collapsed when she learned of what happened to Fudge to whom the woman was attached and considered her companion in her battle with her ailment.