Forest Ranger, starting from Picking Up a Lynx Girl
Chapter 365 - 363: In the End, the Innocent Egg Bore It All

Chen Ying felt a twinge of heartache as she checked their injuries again, ensuring that they were only superficial wounds before going out to find Old Gao and ask about the situation.

Jinya and Little Jin each went to Brother Leopard and Leopard Sister to exchange information.

"Those crows are really too cunning."

Old Gao sighed, "I've been doing bird research for so many years, and this is the first time I've been tormented so badly."

The flock of birds had held back for a day and then came in two groups the next morning.

When the first group arrived, he thought they were observing monkeys and didn't realize they were actually observing him.

Before he could react, the crows swarmed over.

Fortunately, he was quick to dive into the tent and avoid one wave.

Outside, Brother Leopard and Leopard Sister were also helping fight off the crows, and several small animals that specialized in catching birds took action as well; otherwise, Old Gao felt he might have been the first person to be pecked to death on duty by crows.

"Can't we control the number of these overly bold crows?"

An overabundance of any living creature in one area can have a negative impact.

Previously, the group of crows here numbered just a few hundred to a thousand, but this year with two large flocks combined, there might be tens of thousands.

Of course, it's not just in Jiamu Gully that there are so many, but this is the estimated quantity for the entire area from Huaqiu Valley to Old Bear Gully.

And they're especially concentrated on the sparse woods along the river in Old Bear Gully, closer to the bird watching station.

"The bird watching station suffered even greater losses." Old Gao curled the corner of his mouth, "Their nursery for the fledglings was nearly completely destroyed. If it weren't for several staff members who were quick to react and put up the Vigilance Net, all the little birds would have died."

Chen Ying hissed in shock, becoming even more curious - what on earth had so severely offended the crows?

Crows are very annoying, aggressive, and invasive, but usually, they don't attack humans proactively.

Unless someone did something rather impolite to them, earning their grudge.

As for Old Gao, he probably got involved because he watched the fight between the crows and the monkeys, then later went to the monkey's territory to investigate, and the crows took him for one of the monkeys' allies.

Another possibility was that the guy who was stealing the bird eggs was nearby Old Gao, and for some reason, the crows assumed they were accomplices, leading to indiscriminate attacks.

To understand this issue, one could only ask the crows.

There's no rush to solve this problem; after all, the crows won't come messing with the rescue station - the big cats and little cats here are not vegetarians.

However, Chen Ying never imagined that Jinya would be so enraged by Leopard Sister's injury.

Dragging Little Jin with her, she went out, and somehow, the small animals were rallied. The next day, early at around five in the morning, a colleague from the rescue center observation post called.

"What? The crows were driven away? And small animals were injured?"

Chen Ying's drowsiness vanished instantly. She quickly got up, put on her coat, and called for Ruan Mengmeng to go with her and check the situation.

When it came to bandaging and cleaning wounds, Little Sen couldn't beat Ruan Mengmeng's speed.

They arrived at the scene only to find chaos everywhere.

Not many bird corpses, but plenty of feathers, and several unlucky squirrels and weasel family animals that had been mobbed to death.

Chen Ying couldn't be concerned with finding the "culprits." She found an empty space, let Ruan Mengmeng lay out a waterproof pad followed by a sterile sheet and a non-woven fabric sheet, turning it into a temporary emergency station.

For those with minor injuries, Chen Ying soothed them before leaving Ruan Mengmeng to clean and bandage the wounds; for the more severely injured, she took over personally, giving injections and stitching up, working until she nearly broke her neck.

Old Gao and his juniors came to help upon hearing the news.

They primarily dealt with the bird carcasses and injured birds.

Old Gao's junior sister assisted Ruan Mengmeng to speed up the process.

In less than half an hour, people from the Protection Station also came to help clean the site.

Mainly, there were broken branches and even the man-made bird sheds that were affected, and who knows how many bird eggs ended up shattered on the ground.

The main victims of today's battle between the birds and beasts turned out to be the chicks that didn't get a chance to hatch.

"This won't do, we have to find a way to control this. There are too many birds here, and it has attracted a lot of small animals that hunt birds and steal bird eggs."

The cascading effects could ultimately mean that Jiamu Gully exceeds its ecological carrying capacity.

Old Gao scratched his head, feeling his already thinning hair was about to further diminish.

"I think you should consider that next year, many birds might give up coming here to lay and incubate their eggs."

With the help of the rangers from the Protection Station, Chen Ying finally managed to treat all the injured animals.

Those with minor injuries were treated with medicine, hemostatic spray, and anti-inflammatory drugs before being released.

Only the ones that were more seriously injured and lost their ability to move were put into cages and sent to the Protection Station for care.

Those who were even more critical had to undergo small surgeries with Chen Ying before being uniformly transferred to the rescue center at the foot of the mountain for further treatment and housing.

After handling everything, Chen Ying stood up, pounded her lower back, looked around, and called for Jinya with a cold voice.

Old Gao knew Chen Ying wouldn't make baseless accusations, so he leaned in and asked quietly, "What, did Jinya do it?"

"Pretty much, that little guy definitely came to avenge Leopard Sister."

Although, in Jinya's eyes, it hadn't done anything wrong, Chen Ying felt that if it was a natural fight, it would have been acceptable.

But now, it was clear that Jinya possessed an intelligence that normal lynxes didn't have, and its methods leaned more towards those of humans. Continuing like this wasn't good for it or the forest.

Before he started this job, his teacher had repeatedly warned him not to get too close to animals or become too emotionally attached, lest problems arise.

He really wanted to heed his teacher's advice, but who could resist the charms of a furry creature fawning over them?

Now that things had come to this, he would try to guide them as much as he could; what else was there to do?

When it came to the clash between reason and emotion, most people would ultimately be defeated by their feelings.

He thought about a lot, but only two or three minutes had passed.

Jinya timidly poked its head out from behind another tree.

Behind it, Little Jin was also observing Chen Ying's expression.

"Alright, you two come down. Hurry up and let me see if you've been hurt."

Seeing that Chen Ying wasn't angry, Jinya immediately beamed and cozied up to Chen Ying to act spoiled.

The contrast of its adorable appearance and the deep voice of an old man was particularly effective in snapping someone back to reality.

"How did you think to bring everyone to catch birds?"

"No, I just mentioned it to the Yellow-throated Marten and the Large Spirit Cat, and then they invited other guys to join."

Jinya lay down, wrapping its front legs around Chen Ying's leg, looking at him with pitiful eyes.

"My fur has been plucked off so much, I'm not pretty anymore."

Chen Ying had intended to give it a stern talking-to with a cold face, but when he saw Jinya licking its plucked fur, he immediately felt sorry and crouched down to check.

Those darn crows had pecked several small wounds on Jinya's body, all of them scabbed over.

"And Little Jin, it's been hurt too."

Chen Ying grabbed Little Jin and gave it a thorough check to find that its body had even more scabs.

After vigorously scolding the two troublesome cats, Chen Ying sent them straight back to the rescue station to have Little Sen tend to their injuries.

His medical kit was running low, and he still needed to save some for other injured animals that might need it.

After sending Jinya and Little Jin on their way, the injury tally was also completed.

The person in charge of counting looked at the list, their cheeks aching.

"Ouch, this was quite a battle. A total of twenty-seven animals injured, five of them seriously. The Small binturong was the most severely injured, followed by three Yellow-throated Martens, and a Flower Painted Fox with a fracture."

Among the minor injuries, Yellow-throated Martens were the most numerous.

"Looking at the video, apart from them, there was also a Golden Cat and two Leopard Cats that joined the fight. However, no trace of them was found on-site, so presumably, they weren't severely injured."

Chen Ying flipped through the records and let out a sigh of relief.

Fortunately, no particularly large animals were involved, which did not pose a significant threat to the birds. They probably wouldn't abandon this place next year.

The tally of injured birds was also out.

Two artificial bird sheds were destroyed, and the number of nests damaged was as high as twenty or thirty.

Destroyed eggs were evident from at least five different bird species, and on-site, they found a bird that had fought a thieving snake to the death.

The expressions of the people from the Bird Research Institute were somewhat grim, especially two young people who looked green behind the ears, hanging their heads and constantly wiping their eyes with their hands.

Old Gao, who had been silent initially, couldn't hold back after listening for a while and exploded.

"Talk, talk, talk, what's there to talk about? If you're so capable, why didn't you stop it? I saw the record; you were on duty last night, right? The two students also reported it to you, did you deal with it? Now you're blaming others for not handling it in time, causing severe consequences, so what were you doing? Sleeping on your duty?"

Old Gao didn't give him much face. Considering he was the guy's senior and a higher-ranking teacher, he wasn't scared at all.

The rest of the Bird Research Institute people didn't like that guy either, and when Old Gao called him out, not one person stepped in to mediate.

The guy was seething and, after a long pause, managed to spit out, "This is an internal matter for our bird watching station," only to have Old Gao scoff and dismiss it with a couple of "hehs."

Finally, someone couldn't bear it anymore, pulled the guy aside, and quietly reminded him, "Administratively, our bird watching station is overseen by the rescue station; Teacher Chen Ying and Teacher Gao are our superiors."

Chen Ying watched for a while, too lazy to get involved. They were bird experts, so he would just let Old Gao, the bird specialist, handle them.

The five animals destined for the rescue center had their wounds initially treated and were now packed into cages, with rangers helping to transport them to the emergency station.

There, they would undergo simple surgery before being picked up by the rescue center staff.

The other animals, with minor injuries yet requiring dressing changes and observation, were divided into two cages and taken directly to the protection station's animal shed, where they would likely be released back to the wild in about a week or ten days.

After arranging for the injured animals, Chen Ying checked in with Old Gao, who had just seen the guy who liked to deflect blame storm off in a huff.

Old Gao, along with the two pitiful students on duty, placed the birds needing rescue into cages, covered them with dark cloth, and then, with the help of others from the Bird Research Institute, carried or hauled the bird cages towards the bird watching station.

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.