B.C. man helps injured birds with cuddles, CPR and a book of paintings

COLWOOD, B.C. -

As Paul Lewis draws a picture of a bird outside this summer, he recalls painting inside that winter, when he was startled by something smacking into his window.

“Bang! What the heck was that?!” Paul recalls. “I looked outside and there was snow on the ground so he stood out like a sore thumb.”

It was a bird. But when Paul tried to help it, there was no response.

“He was all limp and looked like he was dead,” Paul says. “I’m like, maybe he’s not breathing.”

So Paul brought him inside and started performing CPR on the bird.

“Started little breaths on his mouth,” Paul says. “And pumping his little chest.”

Before he shows us what happened next, Paul says he’s gone above and beyond for other inured birds, like that time he spotted a bird stunned in the middle of a busy street.

“I stopped traffic. He was going to get run over,” Paul says. “I ran out, picked him up, and brought him into my car.”

Paul comforted the bird in his vehicle. It cuddle closed to him, before flying away on his own.

And then there was that other time that Paul rescued a baby bird from a curious cat.

“(The bird) sat on my hand. (Then) his mom and dad were kind of chirping and squawking so I put him on a branch,” Paul says. “They came right over and puked up a little berry into his mouth and I was like wow!”

After the baby ate the berry, Paul says he put out his finger to try and give it a goodbye pat.

“He jumped back on my finger,” Paul smiles. “And I was like, ‘You are the cutest little thing in the world.’”

Which brings us back to when Paul tried to bring that other bird back to life by placing his lips to its little beak.

“He started blinking,” Paul says. “So I was like, ‘Alright! He’s alive again!’”

Alive, but far from lively. So Paul sat with him, gently petting his head, and started showing him paintings of birds in a book by iconic Canadian artist Robert Bateman.

“As soon as we go to the (paintings) of robins, (the injured bird) came back to life! He was like, ‘Chirp! Chirp! Chirp!’ And I’m like, ‘Oh! You like robins, eh?!’” Paul smiles before laughing. “Maybe he knows a robin, I don’t know!”

What Paul does know is that the bird seemed inspired by it all, and before eventually flying away, seemed to express his gratitude.

“I just love how he looked back and gave me the cutest wink and then he flew away,” Paul smiles. “And I was like, ‘Alright! Good luck!’”

As Paul finishes that drawing of the bird he says he brought back to life, he’s reminded that if we take the time to notice what’s around us, and respond to what we see, we just might find that even our small actions make a big impact.