I think that maybe it's dislocated or sprained. Sounds like she may well have a nest nearby. I'd leave her alone in that case, as she still seems able to get around, and if there is a nest, taking her away would be lethal for the little ones. Also, her mate will miss her. Sometimes it's best to leave well enough alone. However, I love animals/wildlife as well, and would probably keep an eye on things to see if any ducklings appear, and to at least monitor her progress, if any. Sometimes we must trust in nature!

I posted on your Plant ID forum thread; here is my reply. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/namegal/msg0121502231960.html?15 That's probably Red Mulberry (Morus rubra) given the very limited information provided. wgreenlee1 could assist by saying WHERE these plants are growing. From your post here on Trees, I'm going to surmise Missouri - where Red Mulberry would be perfectly at home. I am pretty sure that there are no Tilia sp. with this kind of bark characteristics. It doesn't fit any of the birches either. Not even close on poplar or cottonwood (Populus sp.). Since these plants have been observed by you over a long period of time, I'm certain you would have observed Tilia flowers in passing. You should have seen Mulberry flowers, too - whether male or female. This tree is plenty old to have flowered. Those leaves look large enough, within the range of morphology, and appear coarse enough (along with the written description) to fit right in with Red Mulberry. Lobed leaves are just one expression of Mulberry species leaves, but not the only expression. Your location is significant in answering your question, and additional images of the dormant features like buds, stems, and - be still my heart - the WHOLE tree, make a huge difference in offering lucid opinions to the identity of this tree. Here's an old Red Mulberry trunk for comparison.

It most likely is an older baby cardinal. The photo above is a very young bird. What you have described sounds like a bird that is at an age between the fledgling photo above and an adult. We have many here in NJ and it took me awhile to figure out what they were. It takes some time for there color/markings to come in. They have a similar pitch to their call as an adult, but the pattern is a "tweet tweet tweet" or "peep peep peep". They are very vocal when hungry and the parents are usually close by. We had a mating pair that had a female and male baby. The father would constantly be feeding the male, but the female baby was so much more self-sufficient. She would eat seeds off the ground with her mother. Eventually the mother went over and gave the male baby a peck. It was hilarious!!

Atlamol, I was just coming to post a pic I found of a white winged crossbill! But there are 2 probs: 1) I haven't gotten a good look at the beAk yet and 2) I live in northwest GA. My book shows there may be a pocket of red crossbills in this area but does not show any white winged presence. It also says they very rarely show up at feeders but that's where I'm seeing these birds. tsugajunki, I also thought pine grosbeak for a while but then realized it's larger than the bird I'm seeing. There are quite a few of these in my yard - maybe up to 10. What in the world would they be doing so far away from their territory? According to my book (Peterson) they don't even migrate here.