Comments | maewyn_2: Lost baby

maewyn_2

Lost baby

Jan 09, 2009 21:08

Late this afternoon we found a tiny baby bird on the ground. It was flapping around blindly. There was no sign of it's parents anywhere. We didn't want to leave it on the ground for a hawk or a cat to attack, so I brought it inside. I checked some websites to see if there was anything we could to for it. I found a picture of the exact same bird - ( Read more... )

bird, garden

Comments 16

mechtild January 9 2009, 20:14:05 UTC

Goodness, I see that my comment didn't take. Maewyn, I meant to say you have a big heart, and I hope it benefits your tiny patient. Best of luck in your nursing. :)

maewyn_2 January 9 2009, 23:06:35 UTC

Thank you. I was relieved to find it was still alive this morning. However, it seemed to be weaker.

I fed it some more honey-water and it became more lively. I just gave it a bit of crushed strawberry, washed down with more of the mixture. I'm very relieved!

It's also excreting, so I'd assume that's a healthy sign too!

It's still another 30 minutes before I can ring the wildlife place. Hopefully it'll go where somebody can look after it full time.

mechtild January 9 2009, 23:45:00 UTC

I hope the wildlife center can take it; they are surely more experienced at doing this sort of care. I think you showed me a photo of an adult New Holland honeyeater before - extremely cute, with yellow trim on the wings.

maewyn_2 January 10 2009, 02:06:49 UTC

Yay! The baby has a new home! The wildlife volunteer that I rang only lives about 5 minutes away from here. I took it over to her house, where it'll be reared among other orphaned birds. Apparently, like new human babies, they need feeding every two hours. I fed it around 11.00 last night, and at 6.30 am today. No wonder it was weak.

I'll contact the volunteer in a week or so to find out how it's going. I got quite attached to the little thing!

By the way, do you have your kittens yet?

Thread 12

whiteling January 10 2009, 10:23:57 UTC

Aww, I'm so relieved to hear that Baby Bird has got a new home!! It was lucky that it was you who found him! You did a very good nursing job, Maewyn; I know how complicated it is to pull such a tiny bird through.
(Our cockatiels once managed it to hatch a fertilised egg and actually a little one hatched from the egg eventually but the parents were too unexperienced and didn't care for it properly. I had to look on helplessly how Junior starved to death. It was very sad. Human aid is only possible when the parents have already fed the hatchling a few days otherwise it won't take the food from a spoon or something.)

maewyn_2 January 10 2009, 14:28:32 UTC

I'm very glad I found it before a predatory bird or the ants did. We've found eggs that have fallen out of a nest before, but never a live baby. I know it would be "Nature's way" to allow it to die, but I just couldn't let that happen if I could do something to help.

I'm sorry to hear that you lost a baby bird once. It must have been terrible knowing there was nothing you could do. :( After reading what you said about baby birds needing to have been fed first by their parents to survive, I'm so glad that the bird I found had obviously been well-fed prior to its accident and had started to grow tiny feathers.

illyria_novia January 11 2009, 13:55:49 UTC

Oh, Maewyn! What fantastic story! Baby animals have surprising resilience, I found. I'm so glad Baby Bird was found and rescued.

maewyn_2 January 12 2009, 11:36:34 UTC

I couldn't leave it to die. If it was obviously sick, and it died, I'd be sad, but knew that it was meant to be. However, when it was so lively and fighting to live, I just had to do what I could to save it. I hope to hear from the wildlife person on it's progress in the next week or two.