AN OTLEY resident has described how she rescued one of the regular visitors to her garden.

When Pauline Garner found this blackbird lying on her conservatory doormat she feared the worst.

She said: “I found a lump in her throat and realised she must have something stuck so I massaged it down and at the same time ‘performed CPR’ with another finger!

“She eventually opened her eyes and started to move a little so my husband, Bill, passed me some water which I dropped on her beak and she gasped and then started trying to stand.” The bird sat in Pauline’s hands for a while before fully recovering.

She said: “It was such a joyous relief and especially because she is one of ‘our’ blackbird family who line up every day to feed on the raisins we put out. Bill had thought he was giving them a treat by buying bigger ‘posh’ raisins which maybe caused the problem. We’ll stick to cheap raisins in future.”