Abandoned baby bird - what to do?

[TastingTheRainbow]

Posting here for traffic.

In my garden there is a bird nest and one of the babies seems to have been abandoned. It’s on the floor, in the rain and crying out. I’ve been watching it for over an hour and no bird has come back to it. I went to put it back in the nest but spotted the nest is now empty and the other birds are gone. Does this mean it’s been abandoned?

What do I do with it? I’ve already tried phoning the RSPCA but they said leave it and the mother will come back eventually. Except googling seems to say that it will die soon left alone.

Any ideas??

Close the blinds and let nature take its course.

You have to leave it unfortunately for the parents to come back - you can't touch it or they won't come

It's either that or you're buying a huge aviary for this guy to live in

read this by peta, it explains what to do and what to look for in different senarios x

I’ve moved it out of the rain, without touching it, just so it’s not getting soaked. It’s very young I’m guessing.

Oh dear, that's far too young. Put it in the nest, even if no one else is there. The parents may still come back.

You should leave it where it is. They are rarely actually abandoned and moving it will do more harm than good.

Put it back in the nest

Where are you? There's a wildlife ambulance in my area which would come and collect it. Perhaps there's something similar near you?

Put it back in the nest without touching it, but if it's been kicked out because of illness or injury the patents won't come back. Try and find a wildlife rescue near you if you don't think the parents are coming back.

Ok it’s in the nest. The closest wildlife centre to me is closed and the answerphone says to ring the RSPCA out of hours and they were no help.

I guess I’ve done what I can, poor little thing.

If the parents don't come back then you will need to start feeding it worms from your mouth I'm afraid.

It's a myth that you can't touch a baby bird - the parents don't recognise it by smell.

Definitely a myth that parent birds will abandon a baby bird if you touch it. I frequently put baby birds back in the swallow, robin and sparrow nests at the yard where my horse is. The parents just keep feeding them once they're back in.

However, that usually only happens when the babies are older and developing feathers and moving more. That looks like a hatchling OP. Sorry, I very much doubt it will survive. The nest is its best bet and only chance though.

That’s not going to survive, it’s too young

Sorry for the hijack but today a bird flew full pelt into my window. It landed on the ground on its side and was shaking and twitching ... it’s mouth opening and closing and then laid very still with just its leg twitching - I assumed it would die and left it. 10 minutes later it was gone ... can they survive after such an impact??!

Oh dear it is very young, we had 2 last year the mother kept returning to feed them, they were much stronger that your little one. 😥

It's only real chance is if you put it back in the nest and the parents come back. It needs to be kept warm so put some bedding in with it, and if you have a spare rubber glove fill it with warm water and knot it, and use this as a hot water bottle UNDER the bedding.

At that age, baby birds need to kept warm and fed every 20 mins so the prognosis isn't good unless the parents come back.

@BellyAching19

Probably just concussed and shocked.

Feed it some berries and worms. We have revived baby birds by feeding them. Their mothers don't use smell to identify them so don't worry too much about touching it. They do need a lot of feeding though! If it's raining you shouldn't have to dig too far to find worms. Good luck.

Feed it some berries and worms.

Do NOT do this!!!! Unless you know what species the baby is (so you know what it eats), you can kill it by feeding the wrong thing. For example, if the bird is a seed eater, worms can be toxic. Feeding baby birds, especially such tiny ones like this, is actually massively complex and you need advice from a wildlife hospital or bird charity rather than people on the internet. I actually spent 5 hours last weekend in a wildlife hospital being trained to be a "baby bird feeder" (seriously! I kid you not!). It was my first shift and I came away realising that it was massively complex and nowhere near as simple as I'd assumed it would be.

This is probably a stupid question but how do birds that young get out of the nest?

Poor wee mite, thank you for trying to save it

10 minutes later it was gone ... can they survive after such an impact??!

Sometimes they can, or sometimes they recover just enough to fly away a short distance to die.

That's one reason I loathe those 'glass walls' that all the property programs have been pushing for the last ten years or more.

Oh hes gorgeous.